Howzcum?

[+ Lucky]

Lately I've been getting spam from myself. Yes, the sender's address is mine. How do they do that? I can't exactly block my own address.

[+ deej]

I'm surprised you're only seeing this lately. It's a pretty common spammer technique. The social engineering reasoning is that you'll open it out of curiosity because it appears to be "from" you. And it's more likely to reach you in the first place because you're unlikely to have your own address blocked.

 

(Hint: I do have my own address blocked. When I send something to myself, I know it's coming and can fish it out of the junk mail folder. But only do this if your mail service allows this mode of operation.)

 

One reason SPAM is so hard to stop is the mail protocol itself. Absolutely anyone can put absolutely any return address on any outgoing email as long as the outgoing server allows it. This is why most ISPs today will only send mail from logged-in members.

 

Your address made it into the spammer database of "known to be good" email addresses, it seems. They'll use it for as long as it's known to be a good address. The only way to get it to stop is to close that email account and open a new one.

 

I saw a news report yesterday that one of the world's most notorious spammers, in Russia, was recently found dead, viciously bludgeoned, in his apartment. No motive was known. I think the writer had fun adding that last statement.

[KMEM]

"writer had fun"

 

You are sick, sick sick. But, I love you for it.

 

Best regards,

KMEM

[+ Charlie]

Thanks for the explanation, deej. I just started getting spam from myself, and I couldn't understand it either.

[+ deej]

The bottom line is when you receive email "from" yourself that you know you didn't send, it's spam. Even worse, it probably carries some form of virus or spyware payload.

 

Delete it unread. You're not missing anything. Really!

 

Just delete it.

[+ Lucky]

That's what I've been doing. Thanks for the advice, deej.