What is Spam?

Most people realize that spam is the receipt of unwanted email, but what many don't know is that spam can come in various other forms as well. It can come through newsgroups, search engines, blogs and guestbooks, cell phones, and even instant messenger services. All types of spam serve a purpose, and all can be extremely disruptive, annoying, and malicious.

The reason spammers use the tactics they use is because it works for them financially. The only costs they incur are the ones associated with maintaining their mailing lists and maintaining an internet connection. Spammers run rampant for the most part, as noted by how many spam emails a person can expect to receive on any given day. I know that personally, a day doesn't go by where I haven't received at least 20 unwanted messages in some form or another. Nobody enjoys spam (except maybe the spammers themselves), and many countries have passed laws and regulations trying to curb it.

When it comes to the spamming of discussion forums, a spammer will join (or post as a guest, if the forum supports it) and bump really old threads or otherwise post in an off-topic manner in order to either disrupt the flow of conversation taking place there, or to advertise something. Many will utilize the forums signature feature to put a link to whatever they're selling, which is then attached to every post they make.

Obviously, spam and SPAM are two different things. The lowercase spam refers to the junk email and junk messages that have been plaguing the internet pretty much since the beginning. SPAM in uppercase refers to the Hormel food product, which by the way, is the state food of Hawaii. Hormel has made it clear that they do not have an issue with their trademarked SPAM being used to describe the epidemic of unsolicited messages, but they have stated that they would prefer that people refer to it using lowercase letters, so as to not infringe on their trademark. There have, however, been situations where Hormel has asked companies to not use the word spam, as in the case of SpamArrest and spambuster.

Spam Videos

Spam Black List News

Fight Spam With Free Trial Anti-Spam Solution

Singapore (PRWEB) Febuary 27, 2009 -- Email spam has been growing exponentially for several years to a total of several billion messages a day. Spam has frustrated, confused and annoyed millions of...

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Human Assisted Anti-spam Solution Makes Headway Against Spam War

Singapore (PRWEB) January 23, 2009 -- Email spam has been growing exponentially for several years to a total of several billion messages a day. Spam has frustrated, confused and annoyed millions of...

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Intermedia.NET Launches SpamStopper Advanced Antispam for Exchange Hosting

New York (PRWEB) July 7, 2006 -- Intermedia.NET, the US leader in Microsoft Exchange hosting and Web hosting for small and medium businesses, announced a new service to protect Microsoft Exchange...

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Fight Casino Spam Aims to Clean Up Gambling Spam Emails

(PRWEB) October 20, 2005 -- Today a new service was launched to help combat the spread and use of unsolicited spam email from gambling related activities. Fight Casino Spam is a Website which is...

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KickBackSPAM Launches Beta Test Version of Automated Anti-SPAM Application

MINNEAPOLIS, MN (PRWEB) September 16, 2005 -- KickBack Spam LLC announces that the beta test version of its automated anti-spam program, KickBackSPAM™ is now available for downloading at...

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