Spam is any message or posting, regardless of its content, that is sent to multiple recipients who have not specifically requested the message. Spam can also be multiple postings of the same message to newsgroups or list servers that are not related to the topic of discussion. Other common terms for spam include unsolicited commercial email (UCE), unsolicited bulk email (UBE), and junk mail.
How does spam work?
Websites that are less reputable than Yahoo, or have privacy policies that are less strict, may sell your email address to spammers, individuals and companies that will include your email address in their campaigns. Those who send spam have typically purchased a list of email addresses from these websites. The spammers send messages from numerous different and often falsified addresses to all areas of the Web, which makes them hard to track.
How do I report spam?
If you would like to report unsolicited mail (spam), please use the following directions. If you've been sent mail by someone (or some company) that you don't know, do not reply to the sender or follow any removal instructions that might be included in the email.
Instead, if you're reading your email in the Yahoo Mail interface, click the Spam button at the top of the page to report the mail to Yahoo.
The Spam button in Full-featured Mail:
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The Spam button in Basic Mail:
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Yahoo closely monitors these messages to find the latest tricks and techniques that individuals and companies are using to try to evade our filters. With this information, we can update our filters to prevent that message from arriving in your inbox again.
In some circumstances, Yahoo may share your complaint with the Internet service provider whose user sent the message, in order to help the service provider make sure its user stops sending that kind of mail. Don't worry; we won't share your complaint with spammers.
If the spam or abusive email is being sent from a Yahoo Mail account (for example, user@yahoo.com), we'll evaluate the message and take appropriate action as defined in our Terms of Service.
All email originating from Yahoo has an originating IP address embedded in the full address headers. This address helps to identify the sender of the email and track the individual to his or her service provider. If a message appears to be from Yahoo but the originating IP line is absent, then it is not really from Yahoo.
How can I reduce spam?
Here are a few ways to reduce the amount of junk mail you receive:
- Protect your email address: Treat it like your phone number that you only give out to trusted individuals.
- Never send your password, credit card numbers, or other personal information in an email. Yahoo will never ask you to send this type of information.
- Don't post your email address in public places (e.g., newsgroups, message boards, chat rooms) which spammers mine for email addresses.
- Never respond to unsolicited email: this can alert the sender that your email address is valid.
- Never click on a link listed in spam; this will also alert the sender that your email address is valid.
- Never forward spam chain letters.
Note: This information is provided only as a resource. Even if you follow these steps, we cannot guarantee your data will be completely safe. No data transmission over the Internet, or by any other means, is guaranteed 100% secure, but you can take reasonable precautions.
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