What is this web site?
February 22, 2010 1:19 AM Subscribe
I keep finding websites in my husbands email, that are nothing but a list of names. ie..............neville armstrong, neville wishes, neville mp3, neville design, bowling on neville island,who is neville?.
This goes on and on with "neville" this and that. It takes up the hole page and is one big list. Any ideas as to what this is???
Please no lectures on reading his email..........
Yep. As an example, this is my from my SPAM folder, verbatim:
Brenton Arnold
Wilfredo Bowles
Carissa Montgomery
Alfred Becker
Ocean Blu
Carmine Lockwood
Amy Hinton
Don Huddleston
Veronica Morrow
Cyrus Hamm
James Lee
Wilbert Herbert
Benett Robertson
Molly Busby
Lavern Kent
All of whom are trying to sell me V1@Gr4 or are deposed African royalty needing assistance with large sums of money.
posted by louche mustachio at 1:43 AM on February 22, 2010
Brenton Arnold
Wilfredo Bowles
Carissa Montgomery
Alfred Becker
Ocean Blu
Carmine Lockwood
Amy Hinton
Don Huddleston
Veronica Morrow
Cyrus Hamm
James Lee
Wilbert Herbert
Benett Robertson
Molly Busby
Lavern Kent
All of whom are trying to sell me V1@Gr4 or are deposed African royalty needing assistance with large sums of money.
posted by louche mustachio at 1:43 AM on February 22, 2010
As soon as I saw this question I knew immediately who the poster would be.
I mean this in the nicest way possible, and I hope this comment isn't deleted, because what I am saying is genuine, but I don't think you understand computers and the internet well enough to snoop so much. You overreact and think things are worse than they are because you don't understand what you're looking at. There's nothing wrong with not knowing that much about the internet -- we all had to start somewhere -- but the problem is that when you jump to conclusions without understanding how spam works, you're going to punish your husband and son for things they haven't even done.
Here is a not-too-technical article that explains the basics of how spam works.
I hope this helps. Take a breath. Whoever you think "Neville" is, I can assure you that in this case, "he" has nothing to do with your husband.
posted by srrh at 2:24 AM on February 22, 2010 [61 favorites]
I mean this in the nicest way possible, and I hope this comment isn't deleted, because what I am saying is genuine, but I don't think you understand computers and the internet well enough to snoop so much. You overreact and think things are worse than they are because you don't understand what you're looking at. There's nothing wrong with not knowing that much about the internet -- we all had to start somewhere -- but the problem is that when you jump to conclusions without understanding how spam works, you're going to punish your husband and son for things they haven't even done.
Here is a not-too-technical article that explains the basics of how spam works.
I hope this helps. Take a breath. Whoever you think "Neville" is, I can assure you that in this case, "he" has nothing to do with your husband.
posted by srrh at 2:24 AM on February 22, 2010 [61 favorites]
This is definitely related to SPAM. Spam is unsolicited email that tries to sell you things or otherwise scam you. It is just that - unsolicited. Your email box could be filled with junk about buying stocks and you own zero. It could be filled with ads for singles sites and you are happily married. It could be filled with junk selling you erectile dysfunction pills and you are female. It could be filled with letters from the Prince of Nigeria and you've never met him (dear God don't ever reply to those. Please.)
Spammers use any number of tricks to get past the email filters that try to block them. This includes sometimes weird text and links to weird websites. They even might include text from the classics! Don't read into them, just know that these are the tricks that spam writers use to try to get around the people who are fighting the good fight and trying to stop them.
Believe it or not, the US Government has a great website for learning about online safety. I join the others in this thread who think you should learn some basics about the online world: onguardonline.gov.
And I know what I'm talking about since I've been bowling on Neville Island. Seriously.
posted by ALongDecember at 3:23 AM on February 22, 2010
Spammers use any number of tricks to get past the email filters that try to block them. This includes sometimes weird text and links to weird websites. They even might include text from the classics! Don't read into them, just know that these are the tricks that spam writers use to try to get around the people who are fighting the good fight and trying to stop them.
Believe it or not, the US Government has a great website for learning about online safety. I join the others in this thread who think you should learn some basics about the online world: onguardonline.gov.
And I know what I'm talking about since I've been bowling on Neville Island. Seriously.
posted by ALongDecember at 3:23 AM on February 22, 2010
Oy, if you're not savvy enough to recognize spam then god help your husband. Get out of his mailbox before you grossly misinterpret something else. Or worse, open something bad and get the computer infected.
posted by wkearney99 at 5:24 AM on February 22, 2010 [9 favorites]
posted by wkearney99 at 5:24 AM on February 22, 2010 [9 favorites]
I'm going to second what wkearney99 has said. You are putting your computer, your data, and your husband at risk by opening emails that, to a savvy computer user, are obviously spam. You don't give any technical details here, but I don't think it's unreasonable to assume that you're using insecure software to read the emails. This can lead to very bad things. Please reconsider your approach and move to GMail, and only open emails in your own account.
posted by TheNewWazoo at 6:32 AM on February 22, 2010 [3 favorites]
posted by TheNewWazoo at 6:32 AM on February 22, 2010 [3 favorites]
Echoing wkearney99 and TheNewWazoo -- you can easily infect your computer with a virus by opening things like that. Be more careful please. You probably do not want all the data in your computer exposed to some crook in another country, which might happen if you open the wrong things.
posted by anadem at 7:25 AM on February 22, 2010 [1 favorite]
posted by anadem at 7:25 AM on February 22, 2010 [1 favorite]
Please consider switching to one of the many modern, free e-mail services that automatically block spam. For example, GMail.
posted by whiskeyspider at 7:34 AM on February 22, 2010
posted by whiskeyspider at 7:34 AM on February 22, 2010
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by Mwongozi at 1:26 AM on February 22, 2010 [1 favorite]