Mark E. Buckley

Avoiding Email

Just a few more notes on avoiding unsolicited emails. Some of these are not avoidable but try to keep them to a minimum.

Do not download programs from the internet.

Do not sign up for newsletters.

Do not surf the web. Use your business computer for only business reasons.

Do not subscribe to or join web sites.

Do not have a web site. This is not a viable option but just having a domain will generate a small amount of spam from internet marketing firms.

Do not have forms on your web site. Spammers love these. I have seen several web sites that have removed their feedback forms for this reason. Some forms you might consider having are submit feedback form, request a quote form, guestbook form. These are valuable is certain scenarios. IF you do need to have one of these forms, make sure it is designed correctly. They are generally written in ASP, Perl or PHP. Your web designer can incorporate certain best practices to limit the amount of damage that can be done. Some steps involve limiting text boxes, stripping HTML encoding, limiting choices on check boxes and radio buttons, proper error conditionals, user authentication, ip logging, etc. Some great technical advice is contained in Elizabeth Castro's "Perl and CGI for the world wide web." While the book is focused on Perl, the same advice can be applied to ASP and PHP.

Do not hot link your email. Usually if you see an email on a web site, you can click on it to send an email to that person. If you remove the anchor it becomes a dead link. This will reduce the amount of spam you receive. However it will also confuse your customers if they expect an email form to pop up when they click on your address.