As an AOL customer, I get more than my share of pornographic junk mail. In fact, they (the solicitators) have gotten so bold that they arbitrarily instant message and interrupt my online with these lewd announcements.
Why?
What exactly are they getting out of it? Why do they do it? Are there any websites that detail this?
I want the nitty gritty on this, maybe if I understood their perspective I wouldn’t get so infuriated all of the time.
AOL figures their customer base is mostly pervs and deves so that’s the kind of solicitation you get. Since you are still an AOL user, I suppose some small vindication for that view is possible.
**In fact, they (the solicitators) have gotten so bold that they arbitrarily instant message and interrupt my online with these lewd announcements.
Why?
What exactly are they getting out of it? Why do they do it? Are there any websites that detail this?**
It’s not like some guy is sitting there e-mailing you and you personally. No, that guy has a mass mailer, he types a message and sends it as many times as he likes to random e-mail addresses. Beleive me, your not special. Why do they do it? There bored, …and retarded.
Click on the “report” button if you must waste your time reporting the poor slob, but in reality, simply clicking on the little x in the upper right-hand corner of the window will do the job nicely…
Or, a creatively crafted Feltching/munging/squicking insult will do quite nicely
Also of note here is the fact that just like the porno E-mails, these IM’s are not sent by people, they’re sent by mass-IM bots from SN’s they’ve culled from chatrooms you’ve been in. So, it’s nothing personal man!
I’ve just started using mIRC and have just started getting this crap through ICQ.
How have they managed to link up my ICQ with the chat ?
No I never leave my ICQ number anywhere and I’m on dial up so there isn’t anything obvious.
Coincidence?
Why can’t I have a ‘SMITE’ button on my computor like God has? These tossers are just the candidates for testing it out on.(referance to Larson there)
I’m not a prude but if I wanted porn I’d find myself.
Laughing about my terribly appropriate .sig aside, they can spot you several different ways:
1). If you have a profile on AOL. Spammers can hunt down long lists of profiles by searching for a specific characteristic. For example, they could look for all the males who live in Dallas and come up with a pretty good list of people to spam. If even only a handfull of those blunder into signing up for whatever service they offer, it was worth it.
2). If you go into chat rooms. They get lists of who’s in which rooms and make mass mailing and IM-bot lists of those people. Notice that they are often listed as being “off line” or “unavilable”. They are on line (duh!), but have their IMing software privacy setting set so they don’t accept IM’s.
3). If you post to a newsgroup or other forum that displays your E-mail address. Privacy statements don’t stop spammers from ripping out the E-mail addresses and adding them to a mailing list.
4). If you sign up for a shady service that has a weak or non-existant privacy agreement. They make money selling lists of E-mail addresses for spam, you know.
I am a member of the BMG Music Service. They misspelled my last name when I signed up, which is not all that hard to do. I occasionally get [snail] junk mail addressed to that incorrectly spelled person. Guess who makes a little on the side selling mailing lists?
Here’s what I would do as an AOL user if I wanted to remain virtually unmolested:
1). Create a new screen name. Share it only with people you trust.
2). Do not create a profile for this screen name. It makes you harder to find.
3). Never use this screen name to sign up for any kind of service or to post messages to a forum or newsgroup of any kind.
4). When logged on as this screen name, stay out of the chatrooms.
There is a way, both in IM and in ICQ, to get rid of these messages. It does have to do with how you set your preferences. In IM there is a preference you can set where you will only receive messages from people on your “buddy list.” Same with ICQ.
Unfortunately, I am at work and do not have this information to hand. I will try to remember to post the precise locations for both these tricks when I get home tonight. If anyone still wants to know.
