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Archiver > MAMIDDLE > 2008-04 > 1208722945


From: Vital Records Project <>
Subject: Re: [MAMiddle] Spam bots
Date: Sun, 20 Apr 2008 13:22:25 -0700


As long as you remain on these lists, your e-mail address can be
harvested. It appears in the archives, which are fully searchable, every
time you post.

Personally, I will never subject people using my sites to the necessity
of having to reconstruct a broken up address or one that is a graphic.
The majority of researchers are somewhat older and may either have
vision problems or not understand how to put the address back together.
By taking such precautions, webmasters may be depriving people of the
ability to request help.

I prefer to work with the e-mail providers, your ISPs, hotmail, gmail,
etc. and provide the necessary information so spammers can be caught.
The fact is, no matter what a webmaster does to prevent harvesting,
sooner or later, the spammers will find a way to decode the address. If
someone thinks graphics are a sinecure, think again. OCR software reads
graphics and turns it into text.

John & Jodi
Massachusetts Vital Records Project Administrators -
http://MA-VitalRecords.org

> -------- Original Message --------
> Subject: Re: [MAMiddle] Spam bots
> From: "Sue Richart" <>
> Date: Sun, April 20, 2008 12:29 pm
> To:
> Michael,
> Pretty much when folks reply to a post they leave in your email
> address and that is one of the ways you are harvested. Although I try
> to be good, like in this post, I don't always succeed. In addition, to
> the other actions, when you reply and keep part of the original
> message, please try and remove the email addresses from your own
> message.
> You have my sympathies and hope your nightmare is over soon.
> Sue Richart
> On Sun, Apr 20, 2008 at 12:03 PM, Michael Lewis wrote:
> > Hello friends:
> >
> > One of my email addresses (not this one!) was harvested by a spam bot and
> > used to send THOUSANDS of spams throughout cyperspace. I am now receiving
> > thousands of Undeliverable Email Notification responses to these spams,
> > clogging up my mailbox and causing me to spend hours dealing with this
> > overload.
> >
> > As a result, I've gone through all of my web pages and changed any email
> > link to a text only address, such as massmsx AT gmail DOT com. I've done
> > this for all email addresses on the Middlesex County Town Sites page as
> > well. It's not as convenient as clicking on a link, but it prevents spam
> > bots from harvesting your email address.
> >
> > I suggest everyone go through your web pages and change any email links on
> > those pages before you get hit as well.
> >
>
> -------------------------------
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