Solutions to the Spam problem

There are a number of options available, however no solution is completelysatisfactory. You may be able to combine some of these options to build a solutionwhat works best for you, however it is important to understand that the problem of spam is inherent to email and that there is no panacea.

Desktop mail program filtering

One option is to use filters on your favorite mail program. Thunderbird, Outlook andMail can be customized to filter spam. They have general filters, custom “ISP”filters, and third-party commercial filters available. The advantages of this optionare:1. You completely control the mail filters; create as many as you’d like with thecriteria you want. If you want to use a blacklist approach (block certain addresses)or a whitelist approach (only display email from certain correspondents); 2. You candisplay all messages at once, and can delete all junk messages at once; 3. You cankeep as much potential junk email as long as you want (for reviewing, etc). Thedisadvantages are 1. It’s only available on that one individual computer, it’s notavailable when you are elsewhere; 2. You have to “train” the junk filter, tell it whatis and what is not junk email.

Commercial Whitelist Spam Filtering Services

SpamArrest is a commercial spam-filtering service that uses whitelist and is popular.Seehttp://corp.spamarrest.com/howitworks/to learn how it works. Basically, yourcorrespondents are asked to respond to SpamArrest and SpamArrest will ask you if you know this correspondent and want to allow email from them. If you accept,they’re put on a whitelist and their mail will subsequently be allowed automatically;if you deny, their email will not show up in your inbox. There are other services likethis out there.

Use Gmail

Another option is to forward your email to Gmail. The advantages of this are 1.Large mailbox capacity (7 GB), 2. Spam filter, 3. Can respond, if you wish, with yourcurrent address in the From, and 4. Because Gmail lives on the web, all theseoptions are available to you from anywhere you have an Internet connection and aweb browser. You can forward your current email to your Gmail and you would notmiss email from your legitimate correspondents. Also, your correspondents wouldhave your new email address as soon as you respond to their message.

Eduardo De León, page 1