Spam – It’s Our Own Fault

The cost of spam has more than doubled for enterprises in the past 10 months and it’s costing companies about $1,934 per employee a year in lost productivity.

Not surprising to me. It’s our own fault.

Nearly 40 million U.S. “consumers” (that’s us) spent $32.5 billion in response to commercial e-mail in 2003. $11.7 billion of those purchases were spent in response to spam. Total e-commerce spending equals $56 billion, so roughly 20% of all e-commerce purchases resulted from a spam message.

So who is to blame? The spammers or the spammee? (Is there such a word?)

It is up to us, the ‘consumer’ to stop it. It is our moral obligation. If we don’t who will?

Listed below are three of the most important ways of eliminating spam from your inbox.

1. Don’t Feed the Spammers
   Don’t ever buy anything promoted in a spam message. Even if the email looks legit, and even if it’s from a company you know other people have done business with. You are providing economic incentive for spammers to continue the practice.
2. Hide Your True Name
   Create a second (alias) email address/account for online purchases, postings and sweepstakes entries.
3. Don’t Open It
   Spammers know if an email has been opened, so when in doubt, don’t open. Also, disable your email program’s preview pane. Otherwise, the spam email will report back to its sender that you opened it. The result: more spam.

Photo by Sharon McCutcheon on Unsplash

’til next time.