Does your e-mail filter out the worse spam?

[Brian Kent]

I do not get any of the worse of the spam e-mails on my Mac, using the "Mail" program and AT&T and gmail e-mail address.

I would like my mom to get online with an inexpensive computer, but she does not want the horrible e-mails she got long ago.

Does anyone know whether it is AT&T and gmail that are filtering out the worse stuff, or whether it is the Mac Mail program?

In other words, if she gets a discount PC laptop from Staples and an AT&T or gmail e-mail, will she be inundated again or will AT&T or gmail do the filtering automatically.

Thanks for helping mom :)

[Dan Hintz]

It's definitely not the laptop, and highly unlikely AT&T (unless they're using Google email servers). Tell her to stick with a gmail address and she'll likely never see a single spam email show up in her Inbox...

[Brian Elfert]

I use Google Apps with my own domain name and I get basically no spam. It uses the same filters as Gmail.

[Jim Becker]

"Mail" on my Mac really does do a good job with filtration.

I will say that Google filters nefarious stuff pretty well. I'm not sure about pure "spam" as I only use gmail for utility, not my regular email.

[Brian Kent]

She doesn't care if she gets extra ads, just not the stuff she would not have polluting her mind.

[David G Baker]

I use Yahoo for my mail and their spam filter does a very good job. I may get 3 a week that makes it past their filter. I have to check my spam folder because once in a while a non spam gets filtered.

[Bruce Page]

I use gmail for my secondary mail and get very little spam. My provider (Comcast) also does a good job of filtering; I get maybe 1 a week with that account.

[Phil Thien]

I agree that she should get a GMail account. I don't think I've ever received porn spam via GMail.

I do receive an abundance of medical ham at GMail and Yahoo. Enough that I think most people that would find my lost smart phone would assume I'm an M.D. I have no idea why it started. None of it is personal, just stuff about drugs and stuff. Some of it is fascinating, though.

[David Cefai]

POPfile is a brilliant filter and is trainable to your needs. My current stats are 162,062 messages classified, 529 errors for an accuracy of 99.67%.

POPfile is free and multiplatform. When it makes a mistake you reclassify the message so that it learns more.

[Jim Koepke]

Mac Mail has a few tools to help keep spam out of your inbox.

The best way is to have at least two accounts. One you give to friends who do not use the "send to a friend" features on just about everything on the web.

A second email account is used for all of the things on the web requiring an eddress in order for you to see the cute pictures of puppies and kittens.

Lately the only thing that has sent spam mail to my "clean" eddress is someone who received a piece of malware in something someone forwarded to them and ended up with a hacked mail program.

This is why my friends are encouraged to use proper netiquette:

When sending to more than one person, always use the Bcc eddress field.
When forwarding email, always remove the information, at lest the eddress of person who sent it to you.
If you find something of interest send either the URL or a cut and paste of what you wish to share.

If you and your friends wish to keep each other from being hacked, these are some simple rules to follow.

Mac Mail has a feature of letting the user drag the header of an offending email into the junk folder. After that all email with the same sender information will automatically drop on to the junk pile.

For many things that have come to my "throwaway" eddress it has been found the "unsubscribe" feature at the bottom of some emails works. It also lets those who want to send more spam know there is a valid eddress for them to use or sell.

Mac Mail has a bounce feature that has stopped a lot of unwanted spam. Someone mentioned that if the sending eddress is from a hacked account it doesn't do any good. It does let the person with the hacked account know something isn't right with their account.

There are many ways to limit unwanted emails. Some use what is called a "white filter." This works with mail rules so only email from accounts you have designated can come into the main mailbox. Kind of difficult for someone who may not be computer savvy.

Also remember if someone receives an email, it doesn't mean it has to be opened.

One of my friends used to send emails from all kinds of accounts. Since the source wasn't recognized they mostly went unopened. When he asked if his email was received my response was, "which email?" After sorting the whole mess out, he being an IT person began to understand that if he wants me to read his email, he has to let me see who it is from.

Another thing that took him awhile to learn is most folks do not want to go buy new software to read attachments sent in a format that can not be opened by our current software. There are just too many easy to open formats that work across platforms to insist that everyone go out and spend money to read something that could have been cut and pasted or sent as a text file.

Gee, where did this soap box come from. Maybe it is time to step down.

Just my 248890.

jtk