Rob
12-27-2008, 12:31 PM
Over the last few days I have been hit by e-mails bouncing back to me - emails which were supposedly 'sent' by me but hit bad addresses or rejected by spam filters.
The emails look right because they are configured as if they come from my domain. It seems that my e-mail addressed has been spoofed by spammers. They copy email addresses to take the heat off themselves re potential complaints.
Of course the messages sent out are the usual 'performance enhancing' pills etc.
The whole thing is annoying from two fronts:
1. My in-box is being bombarded by returned mail
2. I may be labelled a spammer as some of the addresses the spammer has made up for the first part of the e-mail address are correct
I have had a look around and it seems that there is not a lot you can do about this. The one thing you can do though is to request your ISP or configure your mail server not to forward all mail sent to you even if the first name of the email is not in use.
For example, if someone sends me a mail to abcd@smallbusinesssuccess.biz my server would automatically send it on to my main address.
I have now configured my server just to send me mail addressed to the four or five first names I do use.
This seems to have worked because the number has already reduced.
However, this doesn't solve the underlying problem of someone stealing my email address - all I have done is to reduced the flow of bad returns. All it seems you can do is to wait a few days after which the spammer moves onto someone else's address.
Unless you have a solution of course!
The emails look right because they are configured as if they come from my domain. It seems that my e-mail addressed has been spoofed by spammers. They copy email addresses to take the heat off themselves re potential complaints.
Of course the messages sent out are the usual 'performance enhancing' pills etc.
The whole thing is annoying from two fronts:
1. My in-box is being bombarded by returned mail
2. I may be labelled a spammer as some of the addresses the spammer has made up for the first part of the e-mail address are correct
I have had a look around and it seems that there is not a lot you can do about this. The one thing you can do though is to request your ISP or configure your mail server not to forward all mail sent to you even if the first name of the email is not in use.
For example, if someone sends me a mail to abcd@smallbusinesssuccess.biz my server would automatically send it on to my main address.
I have now configured my server just to send me mail addressed to the four or five first names I do use.
This seems to have worked because the number has already reduced.
However, this doesn't solve the underlying problem of someone stealing my email address - all I have done is to reduced the flow of bad returns. All it seems you can do is to wait a few days after which the spammer moves onto someone else's address.
Unless you have a solution of course!