In particular, having to go through thousands of emails daily, full of spam, promotional offers, fake vouchers, phishing scams, etc can be tiring. Apart from causing low productivity, unwanted emails can pose potential threats in the cyber world. That said, by implementing a few best practices, you can keep the emails that you do not want entering your mailbox and ramp up your inbox security.
In this blog post, I’ll take a closer look at the best practices for avoiding spam messages and other unwanted emails.
1. Use a Reliable Spam Filter
One of the most effective ways to prevent unwanted emails from landing in your inbox is by using a robust spam filter. Most email providers offer built-in spam filters that automatically detect and move suspicious emails into a separate spam or junk folder.
However, not all spam filters are equally effective, and some spam can still slip through. To enhance protection, consider upgrading to a third-party spam filter that offers more advanced detection algorithms, such as multi-layered filtering and real-time threat updates. These filters can detect phishing attempts, malicious links, and even advanced spam techniques that basic filters might miss.
2. Avoid Publishing Your Email Address Publicly
The practice could see you publishing your email address on websites, social media, or forums that spammers frequent to harvest the addresses that they use to send unsolicited emails. If possible, it is also advised not to put your email on social networks and use contact forms instead.
Amidst the necessity that you share your email address online, ensure it is an email account that is different from your primary email account. In this manner, the first account will be free from spam, while in the second account of variable importance of the messages filtered out.
3. Mail Lists to Avoid or How to Stop Receiving Unwanted Mail
Overlooked emails include newsletters, promotional campaigns, or mailing lists that one subscribed to a while ago and no longer wants to receive mail from. There are a lot of ways through which a person can reduce the amount of Spam received, one of the best ways is to clean the list of subscriptions regularly.
Almost all genuine marketing emails include an opt-out link at the footer to help individuals move out from the marketing list. Think about it and cancel the subscriptions from emails often received and not wanted in the first place. Another group of applications covers all possible mailing list-related operations: for example, there is a service called Unroll. Me which helps to deal with a list of subscriptions.
4. Be Cautious When Signing Up for Services
Freemium services, software downloads, and free trials are other areas where you have to be careful, about providing your email address when signing up for services. Lots of organizations will subscribe you to their mailing lists, meaning you will receive several promotional emails.
To avoid such messages trying to get into your inbox, always read the privacy policies and terms of service. Also, always review checkboxes that request your permission to subscribe to their promotional email list and deselect if you do not want to join them. When it comes to services that you will be using infrequently, go with a ‘burner’ email address.
5. Create Separate Email Accounts for Different Purposes
It is also important to have a separate mail for work, another for business, and so on because this way the number of spam messages will be lower. For instance, one will have an account for the person another for work, and another for online shopping and other subscriptions.
That way you do not find your important messages buried in promotional ones or spam emails, which is the reason why you have different email addresses. You can also have aliases within your primary account, which lets you filter messages based on category or sender.
6. Mark Suspicious Emails as Spam
Spam filters are more refined over time as their users provide feedback on what is and is not appropriate. If you select the suspicious emails as spam, it will be beneficial to other users because then, your email service provider will be better at sorting out such emails.
Whenever you select a message as spam it informs the system that subsequent messages coming from the same sender are also spam. On the other hand, if a genuine email is filtered as spam, then remember to rate it as ‘Not spam’ so that they are filtered in the inbox next time.
7. Connect two-factor authentication (2FA)
Phishing emails are also used by cybercriminals to lure people to give them their username and password details or other information. Two-factor authentication (2FA) increases the security of accounts by using a second factor to prove the user’s identity, in addition to the password, which can be a code sent to your phone.
When you activate 2FA on your email, even if someone else gets your password due to a phishing attack, you will minimize the exposure.
Conclusion
Avoiding such emails from getting into your inbox in the first place thus needs to be prevented. To maintain a clean and secure inbox, one has to use a genuine spam filter, not share your email address on social networks, and untick a mailing list subscription now and then.
One can avoid receiving too many spam emails by being careful where to give out an email address and by having one address for one type of use, and another for another, etc. Furthermore, reporting dubious emails as spam and enabling two-factor authentication help protect from threats of phish as well as spam.
By applying these techniques, you will be able to minimize the likelihood of spam email attacks and sort through the messages that you need to see.
