Does SPAM Unsubscribing Really Work? 107
dacarr asks: "An associate on a mailing list I am on recalled an article (which he, in turn, does not recall), in which the author managed to reduce his spam some 80% by, of all things, using the provided 'unsubscribe' mechanism in the messages. This is totally counterintuitive to what most of us have learned (doing so was a spectacularly good way to actually *confirm* your address) - but perhaps this isn't the case anymore, based on this. Has anyone else had any luck as far as this goes? By following the aforementioned unsub links, said associate found a number of broken links and dead addresses (and one link that tried to create an attachment and email it out (which he stopped)), but after three days and 400 unsub links, he trimmed his spam levels 'from an average of 250 a day to just 40 today' - that's just around 17% of what he was getting. Maybe spammers are getting their act together and listening for a change." Do any of you have any anecdotal evidence to provide to confirm or contradict this? Have you been able to lower your spam volume by "unsubscribing"?
I tried it once (Score:5, Informative)
my 2c
Pure Luck? (Score:5, Informative)
Unsubscribe links make cash (Score:5, Informative)
For what it's worth, I read an article similar to this one about a year ago. I clicked all the opt out links in my Yahoo account and continued to discard spam unread in my self-run account. I'm only one guy, which makes this statistically insignificant (and thus, it would be highly irresponsible to do something like writing an article about it!), but I can definitely confirm that the Yahoo spam skyrocketed while my other account stayed the same.
Do not attempt this, you will get more spam (Score:2, Informative)
Re:I tried it once (Score:5, Informative)
After about a month of effort, I reduced my SPAM by more than 1/2 for a short while. Within 3 months I was at a higher level than before.
Just because you unsub from the SPAM source doesn't mean your address is removed from the databases / CDs that the SPAM source purchased. It is the harvesters that are truly evil.
And I have a number of addresses that have never been published and yet occasionally show up with SPAM. I wouldn't be surprised if the harvesters are making use of Outlook addressbook exploits to further harvest.
Re:Not entirely the same method, but effective any (Score:5, Informative)
You create throwaway addresses on the fly (just make them up - no logging in) and email gets forwarded to your real address. Works great for addresses you only expect to receive a few emails from (like when registering for NYT, etc), as the address automatically expires once you receive a certain number of emails. If you want to continually receive email at that address, you can specify an exclusive sender (by email address or domain) to allow email to come in indefinitely.
Works great and is free too.
Re:Yes, it works. (Score:3, Informative)
[disclaimer: I'm associated with spamgourmet -- if that bugs you, please *don't* follow the link
Re:No, it doesn't (Score:5, Informative)
The SPAM and the Internet FAQ is located here:
http://spam.com/ci/ci_in.htm
Re:Pure Luck? (Score:3, Informative)
no (Score:1, Informative)