I am only on two e-mail lists.  This one (Conch-l) and another list
dedicated to fish.  I have been on the fish list for about 4 years now,
and have never received any spam.  Ever since I joined Conch-l, just
about a year ago, I get spam every day!  I believe they (spammers) must
have gotten a hold of the Conch-l subscriber list.  Again, I never got
spam before this list, now I get everything from people wanting to lower
my home mortgage to people trying to sell me pills to make my "marriage"
better!!!! I just delete them all!

Rick, USA
On Sun, 28 Jul 2002 12:24:11 -0400 Lynn Scheu <[log in to unmask]>
writes:
> Steve, and Rika and all,
>
> I too get dozens of these same kinds of spams/cons a week. I think
> they
> are indeed getting it from the Conch-L subscriber list.  There are
> huge
> lists of listserves available out there on the web, and these
> ill-intentioned people use them to great effect. Listserves are
> victimized in many ways, a great pity because they are so useful and
> so
> much fun! Most of them can be reviewed and copied by anyone who
> subscribes. This is a great convenience to other legitimate
> subscribers
> who need an email address, but they are also a boon to the
> dishonest.
> (One wonders what kind of person would be foolish enough to fall
> for
> such nonsense, but someone must.)
>
> However, I must explain that Conch-L does not have a list of
> subscribers
> on a website anywhere. There is a list on the main server computer
> at
> UGA, from which our Conch-L messages are sent out, a list of both
> the
> subscribers who are hidden and those who are not. When someone
> requests
> to review the list, he gets that complete list emailed to him, minus
> the
> hidden addresses. But it is NOT on a website anywhere.
>
> If you hide your email address on the list, that will take you off
> future gleanings of our list by e-con artists, but it will not
> remove
> you from the jillions of such lists already in existence and
> circulating
> everywhere. Changing your email address is all I know that will
> take
> care of that problem.
>
> However, I just heard from a friend who is using a filter to
> exclude
> most of these messages. This person uses a filter with certain
> objectionable words (like the name of the countries in this case)
> plugged into it. That way, any message containing that word or words
> is
> filtered out. We could all try that if our email program will
> support
> filters. I don't think they are too hard to set up. I seem to have
> been
> receiving them for 6 months or more and they are all alike in many
> ways,
> although the wording and approach differ in small ways so surely we
> can
> find a good set of filter words. But be careful what you use...you
> might
> screen out messages you wish to receive...as did my friend...in my
> email
> I told her of my annoyance at these eternal, infernal spams. And I
> used
> the name of a country from which many of these messages originate.
> The
> filter was set on this country name and filtered my message out. My
> friend caught it  presumably because my note was expected and
> didn't
> arrive.
>
> Lynn Scheu
> Co-owner, Conch-L
> Louisville, KY
> Stephen Browning wrote:
>