Spam emails are junk notifications that you receive into your inbox. Typically, they are sent out in bulk from all over the world and blindly target both personal and professional email accounts.
Often these spam messages can contain malware, viruses or pretend to be a genuine company like your bank in order to get critical information from you with the intention of committing fraud (e.g. stealing your identity, or clearing your bank account!).
People often act too late! They expect and hope that the email provider will implement the right level of security measures, but these don’t often work (or they work too late)!. The sophistication of spam techniques are also improving, within malicious hackers using advanced methods to avoid detection and end up straight in your inbox. On the other side, some spam filters are so strict that they prevent genuine emails from getting through. It’s a balance, and there are things you can do (read on).
According to statista, between 2017 and 2020 a total of 1.15 Trillion spam emails were distributed around the globe. To help put that into context that’s 149 spam email for every man, woman, baby, child and senior citizen across the same period – and spam volumes are on the increase!
To stop spam, you need to remove your email address from the internet. You may think that it’s not on the internet, but think hard. Have you ever used it in a profile or post on social media, or when subscribing to new products or services or even as your contact details on a company website? Have you ever given your email to someone over the phone? There are people out there that that harvest emails purely with the intention of selling the email list. Rule of thumb, never disclose your email address unless you have absolute trust in the person or company you are providing it to.
When emails are exposed online, it enables Spammers to capture your email, store it offline with the intention of sending you unsolicited messages (many of which can cause harm).
You can act now by searching to see if your email address is openly exposed online. To do this use the search facility here. You should also review all of the hints, tips and techniques outlined in the sniff.link Wiki.
Once you become aware of where your email is stored and is openly exposed online you can actively work to remove it from the internet.
