Blocking Text Message SPAM

CNET has done us all a great service by putting together a summary of the ways to block text message spam for all of the major cell phone providers. Text message spam is worse than e-mail spam because most users are paying for each one in and out. And advertisers know the value of text message spam because it is hard to ignore. Click on thru to see how to deal with this plague on your provider of choice.

CallerComplains.Com

Even though I am registered with the Do-Not-Call list, I still periodically get a call from an unknown number which turns out to be an unsolicited sales call. (Usually in Spanish, for some reason.) I typically use Google to try and track down these numbers, but now there is a new website that can be of more direct help. The Website CallerComplaints.Com is a free site where consumers aggregate their experiences with Do-Not-Call Scofflaws so that the rest of us can know who left that unanswered call number on our caller id. Click on over and check it out the next time you are not sure who is calling.

Opt OUT of Chase Direct Mail

Ah, it is a week day. That means it is time for Chase Bank to send me yet another piece of mail encouraging me to get a credit card, bank account, insurance product, or just to come on down and surrender my Free Will. If you are as tired as I am of these e-mails, check out this article which provides a way to OPT OUT, at long last.

My goal is someday to be able to take out the garbage on Sunday and NOT have to have shredded any Chase Bank offers that week.

Pay Per E-Mail

One of the reasons that spam and e-mail scams are profitable is because of the low overhead cost. The number of responses needed for a return on investment is less than 1%. (Somewhere I seem to remember it's around 0.01%.) Wired has up an article about a company named Goodmail that for a quarter of a cent per message will verify the message allowing it to bypass ISPs filters. (This requires the ISP to be using the Goodmail technology). For a broadcast of 5,000,000 e-mails, it will cost the sender $12,500. Using the 0.01% response rate, that means that out of 5,000,000 e-mails, there will be 500 responses for a cost of $25 per responder. Will this stop spam or scams? I doubt it. I'm guessing most spammers and all scammers will make at least $25 off of a responders. Supposedly, if a company hasn't been in business over a year or they have a number of spam complaints, Goodmail will not take their money, but I suspect that spammers and scammers will find ways around it.

Spammer Arrested

A big time spammer, Robert Alan Soloway, was arrested May 30. While this will be good for those who are on his spam list if his operation is shut down, spam is, unfortunately, cheap enough to send out that it will most likely not make much of a dent overall. Personally, I get very few e-mails that don't get flagged by my spam filters except from accounts that I have used to fill out free offers. Still, I can see spammers eventually killing e-mail, at least in its current form.