SPAM CELEBRATES ITS 30TH BIRTHDAY

Imagine that more than half of all the world computer users on the Internet using email do not remember a world without spam. It is an Internet scourge and current reports indicate that 90% of all email is spam! "Spam continues to blight e-mail exactly 15 years after the term was first coined and almost 30 years since the first spam message was sent" writes Darren Waters, Technology editor, BBC News website. There is a good reason why we are unable to rid ourselves of spam...it is because the spammers are as technically proficient as those trying to eradicate them. We all curse them daily as we try to sort through our e-mail to rid ourselves of ads for products that promise all sorts of things most of us neither want nor need. To better understand the anatomy of spam e-mail, one can read the site underscored on home computers. Most spammers send through household computers, hi-jacking them so that the owners are not even aware their computer is even being used or has slowed down for good reason.

Of course, too many of us understand the annoyances of spam and really just want to know ways to get rid of it. That solution has not been found nor will it as long as spammers find it profitable. The only way they will stop is if there is absolutely no return on their efforts since even spammers need to eat. That seems unlikely in the near future. At the moment we are only talking about a small amount of their time spent writing the ads, turning them into jpgs, hi-jacking home computers, infecting them with bots to send it out, and collecting money for their service. As long as people are sufficiently deluded by these adds as much as by Bush's campaign promises we will continue to have spam. It is currently as predictable as death and taxes.