Defeating The Spammers The Samurai Way – A Little & Quick Guide to Combat Spamming

Spamming; you must have faced this issue! It’s a usual instance. And today, when the PII (personally identifiable information) is easily available, spamming is becoming a serious issue.

Why spamming is terrible?

Is spam a type of virus?

No.

Then what is spam, and why is it bad? Let’s see.

What is Spamming?

It’s the act of sending involuntary or unwanted messages to a large number of people through an electronic messaging system. The purpose could be commercial, like promotion, etc., or non-commercial. Mostly, spamming is just irritating, but sometimes it can be harmful, as well, if the intentions are deceptive. Because in that case, the content can be malicious or have dangerous links.

Now, a person receives more spammy emails every day; the extent is that, upon analysing, he will find that the inbox has spam more than the essential emails. And that’s one area; there are more channels as well.

Is this the case with you? Are you troubled due to spamming? Then you are at the right place.

And we must say, at the right time.

Because in the digital environment, this problem has become extensive. To understand this, let’s have a look at the types of spam.

• Email Spam
• Content Spam
• Comment Spam
• Messaging Spam
• Social Networking Spam

Well, these were some basic types of spamming. And that’s not all you have to handle. If you have a website, there are advanced forms of spam to be taken care of.

Here are they…

• Link Spam
• DDoS & Bots
• Trackback Spam
• SEO Spam

What are they? How can they affect you? And what are the ways to deal with this?

We will address all these questions in our upcoming post.

For now, let’s begin with the basics.

We have talked about the common ways of spamming. But knowing about them is not enough. The need is to combat that. Taking protective measures is a great way to ensure peace of mind.

And what are those?

Read this post, and you’ll know about that.

Ways to Combat Spamming

Here are the ways to deal with different types of spamming.

Don’t Throw Away Your Information

Don’t provide your essential information like phone number, email address, etc., on public portals. If you need to provide an email for subscribing to any service or participate in fun games, contests, etc., be ready with a secondary email. Alternatively, you can use disposable emails. Don’t submit a primary email. Also, take measures to hide your email on public domains, where not providing an email is not an option. For example – If you own a domain, anyone can check your personal contact details with a WHOIS search. But you can save yourself from spamming by masking your data using the WHOIS privacy service.

Analyse the Content

Most of the time, you can sense the spamming just by looking at it. Especially in the case of email, the subject line can give you a broad idea. If the email appears to be spammy or irrelevant, don’t open it. And even you are curious to check out the message inside and opens the email, don’t click on the links and attachments until you are sure enough about the safety. And that’s true with other channels as well. If you feel that the content seems to be cheesy, don’t waste your time on that.

Don’t Revert to Spammy Messages

“Congratulations! Your email address has won a lottery of $10,000. To claim the prize, kindly provide your mobile number, address and bank account details.” Such a message appears fascinating but stop. It’s just a trick. Don’t reply to such types of messages, not even to ask about details. Many people, even after knowing that it’s false, start engaging and get trapped. So, don’t do that if you want to safeguard yourself.

Make Use of Appropriate Tools

We are in a technologically advanced world. Here, by being tech-savvy, you can block many troubles. Well, you can block spammers too. Upon searching, you will find you have numerous technology-backed options to fight with the spammers or keep them away. All you need to do is finding a reliable tool, plugin, or technique for the same. For example, you want to tackle spamming through comments and forms, use Captcha. Additionally, you can install an anti-spamming plugin. Likewise, you have tools to deal with link spamming and other types of spamming as well.

Don’t Let the Numbers Befool You

When it comes to social media, it’s not just about safeguarding you against spammy messages. You need to go deeper and unearth the hidden spammers. It’s significant to make the most of your social media marketing efforts. Fake accounts following you or vice versa dampens your efforts by lowering the engagement rate and creating a false image of the account in analytics.

Report Spam

To reduce spamming, one of the best ways is to report the spam to the concerned authority. Like to address the email spamming, you can report the particular email as spam to notify the email service provider. This way, they can strengthen their spam filter to control spamming.

In the End

Spamming is a problem. But a more severe concern is the lack of awareness about spamming in people. It’s essential to understand that it’s not an area where you can take a casual approach. That can lead you to a dangerous situation. Instead, the need is to have the basic knowledge and a cautious approach. Besides, there are various methods to prevent you from spammers, but they can help you only when you want them to. To be safe, you need to have the right system in place.

That’s all for now.

If you want to know how to deal with website-related spamming, don’t forget to check the next part of this post, which will be out soon.