Spam Unsubscribing...

[edro]

Originally posted by: Injury

Originally posted by: edro13
I hate the "Unsubscribe" links... They are sooo tempting to use, but you don't know if they will sign you up for other partner's spam or if it is a legitimate Unsubscribe function...

I'm convinced that the saying that unsubscribe links just confirm you have an email address that gets checked is a myth. I know it's certainly possible that it's true, but I had an account that was going to hell (400+ emails a day) and I just wanted to see what would happen if I tried some of them out. (It was a Yahoo account, so I was also hoping it would just fill up and start bouncing back to the spammers, hopefully inflating their costs a tiny fraction of a percent) About 2 or 3 weeks later the amount of spam I was getting went down to about 100 a day. It seems that there were 5 or 6 major "companies" doing all of the spamming, because all of the unsubscribe places had only a few different looks. I haven't checked it recently, but in a last ditch effort, it might work.

 

[DivideBYZero]

Always an email fishing address, never a real unsub.

 

[rh71]

turn off html rendering in your readers too because if you open an image on their servers, your email is "verified".

 

[edro]

Originally posted by: rh71
turn off html rendering in your readers too because if you open an image on their servers, your email is "verified".

Oh wow... I never thought of that! I kind of wondered why Thunderbird blocked them initially... now it makes sense. That could be one of the reasons I get so much spam.

Thanks!

 

[Demon-Xanth]

It used to do some good, but not anymore. I haven't had a non-spam email to my ISP account in about a year.

 

[dullard]

I did it. It eventually worked. My experience was very similar to Injury's experience (but not as extreme).

I had significant spam. I started unsuscribing. The spam increased for 3-4 weeks. But then all of the sudden after I kept unsuscribing the spam dropped to maybe 1-2 spams in a month.

Remember, the people paying for the email addresses DON'T want to pay for addresses of people who will just unsuscribe. So in the long run, it is in their best intrest NOT to sign up the unsuscribers. Short term, of course they will make a few extra bucks and spam will temporarilly increase.

 

[Demon-Xanth]

dullard: in my case, the unsubscribe links STOPPED WORKING. Not always bounced, but usually server not found type of errors.

 

[dullard]

Originally posted by: Demon-Xanth
dullard: in my case, the unsubscribe links STOPPED WORKING. Not always bounced, but usually server not found type of errors.

Thus no harm nor gain either way.

 

[imported_waldo]

I can't seem to unsubscribe to 1 spammers stuff....DQ Media, anyone else nailed by them all the time (outside of course of the usual.....burly sexy hairy women ones)

 

[Pepsi90919]

Originally posted by: rh71
turn off html rendering in your readers too because if you open an image on their servers, your email is "verified".

how do you figure?

 

[edro]

Originally posted by: Pepsi90919

Originally posted by: rh71
turn off html rendering in your readers too because if you open an image on their servers, your email is "verified".

how do you figure?

If the images are using a special link that hits a counter, telling them that your email address is the one that loaded that image... I can see how it could easily be done.

 

[edro]

Well, I decided to start unsubscribing from ALL my junk mail.

Over the last few days, my junkmail has gone from 40-50 a day, down to about 8. Some of them say it takes up to 72 hours.

 

[dullard]

Glad it is working for you. I am surprized you are seeing an effect so soon. You'll likely never get down to zero, but heres to trying: :beer:

 

[TitanDiddly]

Originally posted by: Pepsi90919

Originally posted by: rh71
turn off html rendering in your readers too because if you open an image on their servers, your email is "verified".

how do you figure?

Ever notice how the image names are all stuff like df897q43wnmsa.jpg? That's because that image is unique to you and your address. If that image is ever requested by the server, then they know somebody opened their email. It's popular to have a single-pixel transparent GIF.