*'Plus Addressing' to Tackle Spam* "Plus addressing" is a trick to spot where spam is coming from and stop it from landing in your inbox. Basically, you use a unique e-mail address when you sign up for a newsletter or Web service. If you start receiving spam at that distinct e-mail address, you know it's been compromised.
Do it right from your e-mail program. Plus addressing works marvelously with Gmail, because Gmail supports adding extra characters to the end of your address. You can use the address for sorting or filtering your email -- and the best part is when the address becomes a spam target, use Gmail's filtering tool to send it to the trash folder. Here's how: When you sign up for a Web service or a newsletter, say, my TechBite newsletter, add "+TechBite" (without the quotes) to end of your real Gmail address. My address -- [email protected] -- becomes [email protected]<stevebass%[email protected]>. I choose to use "TechBite," but you can add any character string, say, BestBuy to register on the BestBuy site. Get the idea? Besides Gmail, EarthLink also lets me do it. Unfortunately, AOL, Yahoo, and Hotmail don't. I encourage you to try this with e-mail from other sources, like your ISP or another Web mail service. And if you don't have a Gmail account <http://www.gmail.com/>, you ought to get one, just to use plus addressing. Once you set up the account, have Gmail forward the mail to your real address. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "WebTV Dawgs/Dittos" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/webtv-pals?hl=en.
