Report Spam with SpamCop

Reporting Spam

Sure, reporting spam is one of the best things an email user can do. Due to such complaints to Internet service providers spammers lose their accounts, sometimes have to pay for the damage they caused, and it will get increasingly difficult for them to find ISPs.

But reporting spam is such a difficult and slow task. First, lots and lots of headers want to be examined. Then the real work begins: nslookup, dig, whois and the same again. Eventually, wording a complaint is complicated.

Yes, if this process could be simplified, I'd report all the unsolicited emails I receive, promised.

Reporting Spam with SpamCop

SpamCop is the resource that brings reporting spam to the masses. It turns the tedious and slow process of complaining about unsolicited emails into a fast and interesting one.

The first step towards becoming an avid spam reporter is to get your email address "authorized" with SpamCop. Since SpamCop sends spam reports on your behalf, it uses your email address as the sender of the these reports. This is why the system has to make sure you own the email address you want SpamCop to use when it files reports.

In response to an authorization request, SpamCop sends the URL to a personal spam reporting form to the submitted email address. This form will become a constant companion in your fight against spam.

Reporting spam with the personal form is simple. The most complicated part is probably getting your email client to display the source of the unwanted email message including all header lines. The form wants only this source as an input.

After you click "Process Spam", the SpamCop heuristic analyses the header lines to find the source where the unsolicited message originated. Additionally, the body is scanned for spamvertised Web sites or email addresses.

By default, SpamCop sends reports to the appropriate people at the spam's source and in some cases at spamvertised sites or email addresses. If you do not have a specific (good) reason to change the selection SpamCop makes, don't do it.

Sticking with the defaults, you are a mere click on "Send Spam Report" away from the feeling of having done something good.