Say no to spam

Posted on 10 Nov 2009 at 14:12

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

 1 of 19

Gallery

Spam has become the bane of many a PC user's life. Luckily, there are ways to block these unsolicited emails, as Simon Edwards explains.

Anyone who uses email knows that spam is a serious problem. The amount of junk email many of us receive is overwhelming. The best way to deal with it is to avoid attracting it in the first place. We'll show you how to avoid exposing your email account to spammers, but you're probably already receiving some spam.

There are three main ways to handle these unwanted messages: you can use your email program's built-in anti-spam filter, install anti-spam software or use an anti-spam service.

Built-in spam filters

If your email program contains an anti-spam filter, you can use this to move any spam you download to a special email folder. If it works as it should, all your legitimate messages will remain in the inbox, while the adverts, viruses and other rubbish will be stored in a folder called spam, junk or similar.

Windows Mail, the free email program that comes with Vista, has built-in junk email protection. XP comes with a free email program called Outlook Express, but it lacks an anti-spam filter. You could install Thunderbird, a free email program from www.mozilla.com that works with both XP and Vista, as it has its own junk filter. In contrast to Outlook Express, Microsoft's more powerful Outlook email, contacts manager and calendar program includes a spam filter.

Anti-spam software

Generally speaking, dedicated anti-spam programs are more accurate than the filters built into email programs. Some have a vast number of options that let you tune them and improve how well they work, while others become more accurate as you tell them which emails are acceptable and which are not. Many security suites include anti-spam protection, but standalone programs are also available. The options include Cloudmark Desktop (www.cloudmark.com) and SpamPal (www.spampal.org).

SpamPal is a free utility that scans email as you download it. When it sees something suspicious, it changes the potential spam message's subject. For example, a spam message with the subject line "Enlarge pills 4 u" would appear in your inbox as "***SPAM*** Enlarge pills 4 u".

The program has a lot of options and, with some tweaking, can do a good job of identifying spam messages. However, it's not as easy to set up as many other programs. You'll also have to set up so-called rules in your email program to move tagged spam messages automatically from your inbox to a spam folder. It works with all popular email programs, though, and is a good choice if you don't want to spend any money.

Cloudmark Desktop, which is available for Outlook Express, Outlook and Thunderbird, costs $40 (around £26) per year. It appears as a toolbar in your email program and displays a series of options. You can choose to mark messages as spam or phishing attacks (where spammers send emails purporting to be from your bank in an attempt to make you reveal your account details) and unblock useful email that has been classified as spam by mistake.

The beauty of this program is its simplicity. There are virtually no settings for you to play with, and installing and setting it up is very easy. Every time you flag an email as spam, this information is fed back to the service, which helps to protect other people.