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E-mail
blacklists guarantee that the user will not receive e-mail
from a certain party who is or is suspected to be a spammer.
Blacklists
work with various kinds of spam guards, and some block
more throughly than others.
The
user decides who to blacklist, and unless the user is
blacklisted, the software can never ban a message entirely,
but send the doubtful message to a bulk folder. However,
a whitelist can refuse to allow someone entry if he or
she does not enter the code correctly. Nevertheless, most
are allowed another attempt and are not blacklisted unless
the user initiates the action.
The
exception to this rule is when known spammers are barred
from using internet and e-mail service from the provider.
This is used as a protection for all e-mail users.
In
spam filters, black lists work by allowing the user to
block certain e-mail addresses or keywords in e-mails.
Most e-mails that spam filters suspect as spam because
they contain keywords common to spam e-mails, are filed
in the bulk folder for the user to review.
Periodically,
this bulk folder is automatically emptied unless the user
want to keep the message. Whether the spam appears in
the bulk folder or somehow makes it past the filter into
the inbox, the user can mark the suspected e-mail as spam,
and blacklist that sender.
Spam
blockers offer a higher degree of protection, and like
spam filters, place all suspected spam in a quarantine
folder. With spam blockers, almost all e-mails are presumed
to be potential spam until the user approves certain e-mails.
Like spam filters, once an address is blacklisted, the
e-mails no longer appear even in the bulk folder, but
the messages are bounce back to the sender.
Whitelists
require all potential senders to register first by typing
in a partially obscured code that cannot be detected by
spam software. If someone fails to gain entry, they cannot
send their e-mail, but they are not blacklisted unless
the user specifies that this address should be blacklisted.
While
blacklists are necessary for spam protection, there can
be serious problems that result form blacklisting in cases
where one's computer is being used as a spam zombie. Spammers
want to escape recognition, and many have the technical
knowhow to use spyware to obtain private information about
a client and data bout his or her PC.
If
your PC is unprotected, you are making yourself vulnerable
to spyware, which can allow hackers to infect your computer
with a virus or to obtain your information to use your
computer as a spam zombie, forcing your PC to send out
unsolicited spam to hundreds or thousands of people.
Many
innocent people have been barred from e-mail providers,
lost their internet connections, have been blacklisted
by countless people and have faced fines or even jail
time. Once a person has been blacklisted, it is difficult
to regain one's former status, and this happens often
to people who are victims of spammers and whose PCs become
spam zombies.
However,
since this problem is becoming more widespread, there
are possibilities for mending one's status after having
been blacklisted as the result of becoming a spam zombie.
The process takes time, but sometimes the blacklist status
is reversible.
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