Creating a pseudo email acount

[Guest Wayne77590]

Many times when you register for a web site, download information, or sometimes just generally browse, you may be asked to provide an email account. in most cases this is very innocent, but there are some sites that harvest this information and the blast you with spam. I think the below tip will work on most email clients.

I use Yahoo with the old sbcglobal.net ending identifier. I have several email accounts that I have set up. Most accounts will allow you up to 10 email accounts, and I definitely have filled them up.

However, I have each one forwarded to my general log in account.

For Yahoo, log into your mail account using the Web Application, not the email client on your computer. Go to http://www.yahoo.com and click on mail. You will be prompted for your user name and password. Make sure it is the primary account that you log in to. If you only have one email account, it will be the primary account.

Once logged in, go to the Member Center and once there click on Manage Sub Accounts. For security reasons you will be prompted for your password again. Scroll down and you will see a button that says, "Create Sub Account." There is where you will add an email address. Use whatever your imagination will allow you for the email account, and create a password.

Now log out of yahoo, and log back into web mail using the new account information. When the web mail client comes up, click on the Options at the top right of the screen, then click on Mail Options. Click on POP Addressing and Forwarding and follow the instructions.

Once it is set up, all email sent to the new account will be forwarded to your standard account. If you start getting inundated with spam you can just suspend the account and after 90 days it will be deleted. You can create up to 10 accounts.

I hope this benefits some of you.

Good luck.

[Xplorer]

I just use 2 email accounts, one for forwarding to my main email account which allows me to control junk mail,,,,and spam.

If I unsubscribe from any email newsletter or other info,,,and I keep getting it,,,,I sure like my filter,,,,because I can redirect their email right back to them,,,,and never see anything from them again.

[steve@showland.org]

I have to agree with Xplorer, I keep it very simple. My primary domain uses a gmail setup, for all unknown sites I have a Yahoo ID that I use for spam prevention, if I find the site to be beneficial and reputable then I change my email over so I get the notifications.

[tbutler]

I have a different solution for handling spam. I am on Earthlink.net and they offer an on-line address book as a security measure. If I don't put someone in the address book their e-mails will be held in a file separate from my in box. I can check this box periodically and select e-mails to be added to my address book. I have three options with e-mails that are spam, I can simply leave them and they will be deleted after two weeks. The second option is to report them as spam. In theory, they report the sender to their internet provider who would take action to shut down their site. The third option is to block all messages from a particular URL. I can use the second and third options together. The e-mail address that I have on this site is the one that I have been using for over six years. My spam messages are caught by this filter and are almost gone. Nothing gets through the filter. As a matter of course I always report spam and if possible block it. Of course I can't block something from yahoo.com because I have too many friends who use yahoo. On the other hand, I suspect that yahoo gets the message from earthlink complaining of the spamming and takes appropriate action.

Everyone whose e-mail is blocked by this message gets an automatic reply letting them know their message is blocked and that they may send a brief appeal message to me. I get those in my in box and they alert me to the fact that someone is trying to reach me via e-mail. I don't get any appeals from spammers, not even from commercial advertisers. The system works great for me.

[skyking8]

A good way to handle the issue is to get yourself an Anonymous email address. Some ISPs provide that service. If not it can be gotten from a third party provider.