NuffNang

Tuesday, June 12, 2012

To BCC or Not? - Let's Stop the Spam

I mean seriously is it too hard to understand a simple email program and use the bloody thing correctly to protect peoples privacy?
Computers have been around since ….. what 1990 (common use) email for just about a long. Email has been common use since 2000 (or thereabouts)

How many spam emails do you receive daily? 10, 20, 30? or more? I imagine that businesses receive 100's if not 1000's.

If employees used BCC for group emails, then spam would be greatly reduced. Just tonight I received an email from a sporting organisation (state based) and in the CC section, there are 25 email addresses.

6 are ISP addresses, like Telstra and Optus
1 is Government defence address
1 private business
15 are free email addresses (predominately hotmail!)
1 is a large business
1 is a "mobileme" address

So big deal you say………………

If everyone on that list forwarded the email without cleaning up the email addresses in the CC line - YOUR email address has been exposed 1 x 25 = 25, and each recipient forwarded that email twice, and  every person who received that email also sent it forward by two. Your email address has been sent to 30,065,107 people (If I am not mistaken) IN SEVEN (7) days……………………….

See how evil not using BCC can be?

Do you know how much a viable (working) email address is worth? It's worth between $10 and $30 on the black market. Value of Email on the Black Market Now add to that any other personal information a hacker or spammer has been able to determine and you can immediately double that value!

So USE BCC, Train your staff, train your parents, train your children and stop the spam.

The meaning of  CC and BCC (Old School)
CC = Carbon Copy
BCC - Blind Carbon Copy

4 comments:

  1. My local council once sent an email with the recipients addresses displayed. It was quite mortified when I complained.

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  2. Ouch - Did they at least send an apology email to all recipents? (without the CC field filled?)

    Flippin' hell, How long ago was that?

    Thanks ONCE again for the comments Andrew, really appreciated!

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  3. About five years ago. I certainly received an apology and later a reassuring email from the Mayor. I doubt they would have drawn attention to the mistake by telling all the recipients.

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    Replies
    1. Five years? I would have to say, still within the 'learning curve' for government :(

      At least you received an acknowledgement!

      But 5 years later, for the same thing still to occur? Problematic to say the least.

      I love getting input from others Andrew and you always take to the time to comment. Thank-you!

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