A man walks into a bar with a dog, orders a drink, and tells the bartender he wants to sell him a life insurance policy. The bartender chases the man out. The next day, the man returns with two dogs. The result is the same. When the man returns with three dogs the following day, the bartender asks why the man keeps coming back with more dogs each day. The man thinks for a moment, then says, “Because they’re a good distraction and you’re giving me a free drink each time I’m here.”
Okay, terrible joke. But, it’s the reality of spam. The man is like the scammers who fill our email inboxes with junk. The dogs are the emails themselves. Thus, each day, unless we can find a way to break the cycle, we get an increasing number of emails from people who are looking for a free ride in life.
In a very unscientific survey of my junk mail, I discovered that approximately ten percent were directly credit related. The emails offered me loans, opportunities to refinance through the government’s HARP program, tax relief, coupons to save money, and online shopping opportunities. This doesn’t count the chance to buy my own jet or go on safari to South Africa.
Here’s a short list of some of those spammy titles:
- HARP Eligible
- Experian
- Amazon Voucher
- Tax Defense
- FHA Rate Lock Support
- Affordable
What do most of these emails have in common? First, most contain very little text. Usually, they consist of a few links and may contain an image. Make the mistake of clicking anywhere on that image and you’ll be taken to a website used for phishing or malware distribution. The tricky part about these images is that they may include text disguised to look like links. Be cautious when poking around because clicking anywhere on the image will activate the link.
Other tricks used by the spammers include adding background colors on links to make them more obvious and look less like the hundreds of other identical email scams we see.
Unlike the bartender, who could simply stop serving the man, getting rid of spam is much more difficult. Using the “opt out” link in the email would be tantamount to giving the man another drink and telling him to come back the following day. The only real solution (short of using a service that requires everyone who emails you to register) is to mark the email as spam and hope the sender doesn’t have any friends who own more dogs.
