subject: Dealing with Spam Email [print this page] Dealing with Spam Email Dealing with Spam Email
How to Deal with Spam in your Inbox
Most people nowadays use some sort of spam filter for their emails. Some service providers automatically detect it and dump it into a folder to be kept for a specific length of time. Others simply label it for you to decide whether or not to junk it. Or you may have downloaded a specific spam filter. It could be a free one, or you might have had to pay for certain features.
Get a better Spam filter
But however it works, can you be absolutely sure that nothing slides into your spam category that shouldn't? For most people, the answer to that question is, No'. Many feel so paranoid about the possibility of losing what they need that they have to check every single email, which can be in the 10s or 100s every day.
An easier way
There are ways to avoid looking at everything and still be confident that you haven't lost anything valuable.
Spelling matters
Checking through your list of incoming spam, look to see if the email has been sent to your correct email address. If it is incorrectly spelt or somehow tampered with, but it still got through to you, it has to be spam. If it's sent to a group name that you don't recognize from someone whose name you don't know, it's going to be spam.
Recurring Emails
Secondly, check if it appears in your incoming list three or four times consecutively. If so, it's going to be spam. Somehow you've got onto the spammers' database from more than one source.
Who is the Sender
When you come to an individual email sent to your correct address, look at the sender. If you don't recognize it, it's not necessarily spam. It could have been sent from someone you know using someone else's computer. There are people with strange names out there.
Taking a second look at Specific Emails
This is where you highlight the item to look at a preview. Just by looking at the title and first line, you'll be able to tell if this is something you really need to read. In the unlikely event that you find an email that you need to keep or reply to, move it straight away back into your in-box, a folder that you use to keep messages that need your attention.
Empty the Spam folder
When you've checked them all, empty the spam folder immediately to delete those that are left. That way you only have to check through them once.
You could do this once a day, but then there might be so many that it takes you quite a while. You could do it whenever you hear the emails ping in, or get a pop-up message letting you know you have mail. If you don't like to be interrupted that way, you could do it, say, three times each day. Do it when it is right for you.
Check Spam no more
If you check your spam like this regularly, you can be confident that nothing you need is slipping into the spam filter and getting lost. You'll quickly free up your system, and your time, for the things that really matter.
