NOTE: It's not very thorough and a little misleading. I wonder about the age of this article? The list at the bottom has combined ISPs with email service providers or email software which are not the same thing like American Online and Earthlink (and isn't Earthlink gone now?) and Outlook.
It did not include how to report spam under Google and Yahoo, two of the biggest providers of email in the nation. And I'm sure many are left off.
Yahoo has a similar reporting procedure as the one listed for America On-Line (email provider) by just clicking the email and reporting is as spam. I don't know about Google but I imagine they would have one too. Does Earthlink even exist any more and if so it's not an ISP either? Outlook is an application and must be configured to "point" to email providers to even process email or other resources.
The good point about this article is that as computer and internet users we need to be aware that these problems exist, that we will all run into them and need to be aware how to handle them when they do occur. I use Yahoo for email and Vista's "Windows Mail" for my front end email application and there are many other tools to do the different things that are necessary. I hope the rest of you know how to protect yourselves and stay secured from spam, spyware, viruses, worms and unwanted access. It does require a jumbled mess which creates layers of attempted protection and some of this might compromise or confuse what's already there.
I DO NOT use any accounts requiring a password if I am online at an unsecured wireless site. I also have back end software that is constantly updated that also protects from intrusion while at unsecured wireless sites. Sometimes an unsecured site is all that's available and I'll use it for information only. I don't full-time and therefore don't pay for the security hardware and software since I have it at the stickhouse, and choose not to have a redundant system in the RV because it's too expensive for us as retirees. I have NEVER, EVER been a victim of viruses, or worms, but have seen or recovered persons who have been. I don't wish that nightmare on anyone. It is cruel and wrong and wasteful and I believe that the criminals should have their fingers chopped off, unfortunately many of them become engineers at companies that provide the protection tools since they know what holes to fill.
Don't forget to backup your files on a regular basis in the event of an incident. You don't have to backup the whole disk, just the files that you do not already have on media (CDs, DVDs, USB storage, other portable storage, etc.) They are needed to recover your system, otherwise the only fix is to "wipe the disk clean" only to start over and wait the the next time.
Your situation may vary or be different. The post Waynem provided is very useful in describing the problem and while it is not the full solution for everyone, it is a good start to get us thinking about it. So seek what you need to prevent what was described in there! Stay safe and secure everyone.
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