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Q: What is SPAM/UCE/MAILBOMBING/CHAIN LETTERS?
A: SPAM or SPAMMING is generally unsolicited/unwanted mail or messages that are randomly cross posted to multiple User Groups. This includes, but is not limited to, sexually oriented material/advertisements,make money fast schemes, multilevel marketing and just about anything else you can imagine.
UCE is what is commonly known by the Post Office as "junk mail", and usually consists of advertisements to buy something. Other types are "chain" letters, and those types of letters that say if you don't forward them you will have bad luck. There are servers on the Internet whose sole purpose is supporting this type of activity, because they make money this way.
MAILBOMBING is the nasty practice of sending multiple messages to one (or more) users with the sole object of overloading their allocated file system space. All of these three practices are unwanted intrusions.
If you feel you have been subjected to these unsavory practices, please forward ONE copy (only) of the mail message to the userid "abuse" and our Abuse Systems Administrator will look into the matter. Also, it is important to make sure to forward the COMPLETE message, including ANY header information. Without all of the header information, there is no way to trace back to the originating sender/domain.
Background Comments
It bothers us that our customers are subjected to this type of material. Unfortunately, this is "protected" expression and not illegal, per se. There was an attempt by Congress to suppress this recently, but it was overridden by various groups purporting to be for First Amendment Rights. The sad truth is that it is a Big Business, on the street and on the Internet. We here at SEI are constantly working to keep this type of material isolated. The worst part is that we, by necessity must be "reactive" as opposed to "proactive" in this regard. We can only deny access after someone complains to us about this type of trash, and only by one address at a time. The spammer can come back again by falsifying a different address. That is the nature of the problem. Occasionally, if the spammer is using multiple addresses from the same server/domain name, we will block the complete domain. This also happens if contact cannot be made with the systems administrator for the domain in question.
SEI Data takes a hard line against spammers using our system. If you (or someone else) uses your userid to generate this type of material your userid can be suspended or revoked.(This is why password protection is so important!) This is an administrative decision by the System Administrator.
What can you do? Every time you get one of these types of emails, please forward the complete email to abuse and we will take care of it. Click here for information on expanding headers.
Also, you should know that people who send this trash "mine" the newsgroups and ICQ for addresses, so basically if you don't want this type of mail, then don't post messages to the newsgroups, although this is NOT a guarantee that you won't get spammed.
Also, never respond to a spam email that says you can be removed. All this does is validate your account, and it will probably be resold over and over and you will still get spam.
There are also multiple "locator" servers out there that may or may not have information about you. You can request your information be removed from them, when you find them, one server at a time. You must do this to the server in question, NOT to seidata. Some servers can find your address/telephone number and cross it to a map and show exactly where you live. In "cybersociety" there is not a lot of privacy. There are also internet providers out there whose sole purpose in life is to sell email addresses, just as there are others who sell address for Postal Service junk mail.
Users sometimes wonder why they get mail that isn't specifically addressed to them. This is a result of the sender using a mailing list (that is the address you see) that contains your address. The most common one is Friend@Public.com but there are a host of others.
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