#855 Mail Tracker - Good to know

Thanks, Grier.

This is great, check it all out!    E-Mail Tracker Programs -- very interesting and a must read!  The man that sent this information is a computer tech.  He spends a lot of time clearing the junk off computers for people and listens to complaints about speed.  All forwards are not bad, just some.  Be sure you read the very last paragraph.  _________________________________________ He wrote: By now, I suspect everyone is familiar with snopes.Com  and/ortruthorfiction.Com for determining whether information received via email is just that:  true/false or fact/fiction.  Both are excellent sites.   Advice from snopes.Com   VERY IMPORTANT!! 1) Any time you see an email that says "forward this on to '10' (or however many) of your friends", "sign this petition", or "you'll get bad luck" or "you'll get good luck" or "you'll see something funny on your screen after you send it" or whatever --- it almost always has an email tracker program attached that tracks the cookies and emails of those folks you forward to.  The host sender is getting a copy each time it gets forwarded and then is able to get lists of 'active' email addresses to use in SPAM emails or sell to other Spammers.  Even when you get emails that demand you send the email on if you're not ashamed of God/Jesus --- that is email tracking, and they are playing on our conscience.  These people don't care how they get your email addresses - just as long as they get them.  Also, emails that talk about a missing child or a child with an incurable disease "how would you feel if that was your child" --- email tracking.  Ignore them and don't participate!   2) Almost all emails that ask you to add your name and forward on to others are similar to that mass letter years ago that asked people to send business cards to the little kid in Florida who wanted to break the Guinness Book of Records for the most cards.  All it was, and all any of this type of email is, is a way to get names and 'cookie' tracking information for telemarketers and Spammers -- to validate active email accounts for their ownprofitable purposes.   You can do your Friends and Family members a GREAT favor by sending this information to them.  You will be providing a service to your friends.  And you will be rewarded by not getting thousands of spam emails in the future!  Do yourself a favor and STOP adding your name(S) to those types of listing regardless how inviting they might sound! Or make you feel guilty if you don't! It's all about getting email addresses and nothing more.   You may think you are supporting a GREAT cause, but you are NOT!   Instead, you will be getting tons of junk mail later and very possibly a virus attached!  Plus, we are helping the Spammers get rich!  Let's not make it easy for them! ALSO:  Email petitions are NOT acceptable to Congress of any other organization - I.e. Social security, etc.  To be acceptable, petitions must have a "signed signature" and full address of the person signing the petition, so this is a waste of time and you are just helping the email trackers.       T ips for Handling Telemarketers  Three Little Words That Work!!  (1)The three little words are: 'Hold On, Please...'   Saying this, while putting down your phone and walking off (instead of hanging-up immediately) would make each telemarketing call so much more time-consuming that boiler room sales would grind to a halt. Then when you eventually hear the phone company's 'beep-beep-beep' tone, you know it's time to go back and hang up your handset, which has efficiently completed its task.  These three little words will help eliminate telephone soliciting..    (2) Do you ever get those annoying phone calls with no one on the other end?  This is a telemarketing technique where a machine makes phone calls and records the time of day when a person answers the phone. This technique is used to determine the best time of day for a 'real' sales person to call back and get someone at home.   What you can do after answering, if you notice there is no one there, is to immediately start hitting your # button on the phone, 6 or 7 times as quickly as possible. This confuses the machine that dialed the call, and it kicks your number out of their system.. Gosh, what a shame not to have your name in their system any longer!!!  (3) Junk Mail Help:  When you get 'ads' enclosed with your phone or utility bill, return these 'ads' with your payment. Let the sending companies throw their own junk mail away.   When you get those 'pre-approved' letters in the mail for everything from credit cards to 2nd mortgages and similar type junk, do not throw away the return envelope. Most of these come with postage-paid return envelopes, right? It costs them more than the regular 44 cents postage, 'IF' and when they receive them back.   It costs them nothing if you throw them away! The postage was around 50 cents before the last increase and it is according to the weight. In that case, why not get rid of some of your other junk mail and put it in these cool little, postage-paid return envelopes.  One of Andy Rooney 's (60 minutes) ideas.  Send an ad for your local chimney cleaner to American Express. Send a pizza coupon to Citibank. If you didn't get anything else that day, then just send them their blank application back! If you want to remain anonymous, just make sure your name isn't on anything you send them.  You can even send the envelope back empty if you want to just to keep them guessing! It still costs them 44 cents. The banks and credit card companies are currently getting a lot of their own junk back in the mail, but folks, we need to OVERWHELM them. Let's let them know what it's like to get lots of junk mail, and best of all they're paying for it...Twice!   Let's help keep our postal service busy since they are saying that e-mail is cutting into their business profits, and that's why they need to increase postage costs again. You get the idea! If enough people follow these tips, it will work I have been doing this for years, and I get very little junk mail anymore.  THIS JUST MIGHT BE ONE E-MAIL THAT YOU WILL WANT TO FORWARD TO YOUR FRIENDS

#855

#848 JURY DUTY- DO NOT DELETE WITHOUT READING

Thanks, Orv. I posted this as post #324 November 28, 2007. It is worth  repeating.

Pass this on to your grown children and anyone else you can think of. This has been verified by the FBI (their link is also included below). Please pass this on to everyone in your email address book. It is spreading fast so be prepared should you get this call. Most of us take a summons for jury duty seriously, but enough people skip out on their civic duty that a new and ominous kind of fraud has surfaced.

The caller claims to be a jury DUTY coordinator. If you protest that you never received a summons for jury duty, the Scammer asks you for your Social Security number and date of birth so he or she can verify the information and cancel the arrest warrant. Give out any of this information and bingo; your identity was just stolen.

The fraud has been reported so far in 11 states, includingOklahoma , Illinois , andColorado , AZ and more. This (swindle) is particularly insidious because they use intimidation over the phone to try to bully people into giving information by pretending they are with the court system.

The FBI and the federal court system have issued nationwide alerts on their web sites, warning consumers about the fraud.  Check it out here:
http://www.fbi.gov/page2/june06/jury_scams060206.htm

And here:

http://www.snopes.com/crime/fraud/juryduty.asp

Yep! It's true

#848

#769 Jury Duty Scam

DO NOT DELETE WITHOUT READING !
Pass this on to your grown children. This has been verified by the FBI (their link is also included below). Please pass this on to everyone in your email address book. It is spreading fast so be prepared should you get this call. Most of us take those summonses for jury duty seriously, but enough people skip out on their civic duty that a new and ominous kind of fraud has surfaced.
The caller claims to be a jury coordinator.. If you protest that you never received a summons for jury duty, the scammer asks you for your Social Security number and date of birth so he or she can verify the information and cancel the arrest warrant. Give out any of this information and bingo; your identity was just stolen. 
The fraud has been reported so far in 11 states, including Oklahoma , Illinois , and Colorado . This (swindle) is particularly insidious because they use intimidation over the phone to try to bully people into giving information by pretending they are with the court system.
The FBI and the federal court system have issued nationwide alerts on their web sites, warning consumers about the fraud. Check it out here: http://www.fbi.gov/page2/june06/jury_scams060206.htm

And it also been verified here as well:
http://www.snopes.com/fraud/identity/juryduty.asp

#769

#671 More E-mail Precautions

Thanks, Merle. These are important reminders.

E-MAIL TRACKING

Here is something everyone should read and take the advice. If you don't, you're hurting yourself and your email buddies.

By now, I suspect everyone is familiar with www.snopes.com and/or www.truthorfiction.com for determining whether information received via email is just that: true/false or fact/fiction. Both are excellent sites.

Advice from Snopes.com Very important!

1) Any time you see an E-Mail that says forward this on to '10' (or however many) of your friends, sign this petition, or you'll get bad luck, good luck, you'll see something funny on your screen after you send it, or whatever, it almost always has an E-Mail tracker program attached that tracks the cookies and E-Mails of those folks you forward to.

The host sender is getting a copy each time it gets forwarded and then is able to get lists of 'active' E-Mail addresses to use in SPAM E-Mails, or sell to other spammers. Even when you get emails that demand you send the email on if you're not ashamed of God/Jesus ....that's E-mail tracking and they're playing on your conscience. These people don't care how they get your email addresses - just as long as they get them. Also, emails that talk about a missing child or a child with an incurable disease - "how would you feel if that was your child"....E-mail Tracking!!!

Ignore them and don't participate!

2) Almost all E-Mails that ask you to add your name and forward on to others are similar to that mass letter years ago that asked people to send business cards to the little kid in Florida who wanted to break the Guinness Book of Records for the most cards. All it was, and all any of this type of E-Mail is, is a way to get names and 'cookie' tracking information for telemarketers and spammers - - to validate active E-Mail accounts for their own profitable purposes.

You can do your friends and family members a GREAT favour by sending this information to them; you will be providing a service to your friends, and will be rewarded by not getting thousands of spam E-Mails in the future!

If you have been sending out (FORWARDING) the above kinds of E-Mail, now you know why you get so much SPAM!

Do yourself a favour and STOP adding your name(s) to those types of listings regardless how inviting they might sound!...or make you feel guilty if you don't!...it's all about getting email addresses - nothing more!

You may think you are supporting a GREAT cause, but you are NOT! Instead, you will be getting tons of junk mail later and very possibly a virus attached! Plus, you are helping the spammers get rich! Let's stop making it easy for them!

Also: E-Mail petitions are NOT acceptable to Government, or any other organization – i.e. social security, etc. To be acceptable, petitions must have a signed signature and full address of the person signing the petition, so this is a waste of time and you're just helping the Email trackers.

Please read the full story here:
http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/petition/internet.asp

And here’s another take on the subject:

IMPORTANT!! HOW TO FORWARD EMAIL APPROPRIATELY

A friend who is a computer expert received the following directly from a
system administrator for a corporate system. It is an excellent message that ABSOLUTELY applies to ALL of us who send e-mails. Please read the short letter below, even if you're sure you already follow proper procedures.

Do you really know how to forward e-mails? 50% do; 50% DO NOT.

Do you wonder why you get viruses or junk mail? Do you hate it?

Every time you forward an e-mail there is information left over from the people who got the message before you, namely their e-mail addresses & names. As the messages get forwarded along, the list of addresses builds, and builds, and builds, and all it takes is for some poor sap to get a virus, and his or her computer can send that virus to every e-mail address that has come across his computer.

Or, someone can take all of those addresses and sell them or send junk mail to them in the hopes that you will go to the site and he will make five cents for each hit. That's right, all of that inconvenience over five cents

How do you stop it?
Well, there are several easy steps:

(1) When you forward an e-mail, DELETE all of the other addresses
that appear in the body of the message (at the top).. That's right, DELETE
them. Highlight them and delete them, backspace them, cut them, whatever it is you know how to do. It only takes a second. You MUST click the 'Forward' button first and then you will have full editing capabilities against the body and headers of the message. If you don't click on 'Forward' first, you won't be able to edit the message at all.

(2) Whenever you send an e-mail to more than one person, do NOT use the To: or Cc: fields for adding e-mail addresses. Always use the BCC: (blind carbon copy)field for listing the e-mail addresses. This is the way the people you send to will only see their own e-mail address. If you don't see your BCC: option click on where it says To: and your address list will appear. Highlight the address and choose BCC: and that's it, it's that easy. When you send to BCC: your message will automatically say 'Undisclosed Recipients' in the 'TO:' field of the people who receive it.

(3) Remove any 'FW :' in the subject line. You can re-name the subject if you wish or even fix spelling.

(4) ALWAYS hit your Forward button from the actual e-mail you are reading. Ever get those e-mails that you have to open 10 pages to read the one page with the information on it? By Forwarding from the actual page you wish someone to view, you stop them from having to open many e-mails just to see what you sent.

(5) Have you ever got an email that is a petition? It states a position and asks you to add your name and address and to forward it to 10 or 15 people or your entire address book. The email can be forwarded on and on and can collect thousands of names and email addresses.

A FACT: The completed petition is actually worth a couple of bucks to a professional spammer because of the wealth of valid names and email addresses contained therein. If you want to support the petition, send it as your own personal letter to the intended recipient. Your position may carry more weight as a personal letter than a laundry list of names and email address on a petition.
(Actually, if you think about it, who's supposed to send the petition in to whatever cause it supports? And don't believe the ones that say that the email is being traced, it just ain't so!)

(6) One of the main ones I hate is the ones that say that something like, 'Send this email to 10 people and you'll see something great run across your screen.' Or, sometimes they'll just tease you by saying something really cute will happen.
IT AINT GONNA HAPPEN!!!!!
(Trust me, I'm still seeing some of the same ones that I waited on 10 years ago!) I don't let the bad luck ones scare me either, they get trashed.

(7) Before you forward an Amber Alert, or a Virus Alert, or some of the other ones floating around nowadays, check them out before you forward them. Most of them are junk mail that's been circling the net for YEARS! Just about everything you receive in an email that is in question can be checked out at Snopes. Just go tohttp://www.snopes.com/

Its really easy to find out if it's real or not. If it's not, please don't pass it on.

So please, in the future, let's stop the junk mail and the viruses.

Finally, here's an idea!!! Let's send this to everyone we know (but strip my address off first, please). And send them using the BBC (Blind Carbon Copy.)
This Is something that SHOULD be passed on.


#671