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Email Cleanup: Is 'Unsubscribe' advised [vanity]
self | 03/14/2024 | fwdude

Posted on 03/14/2024 7:28:07 AM PDT by fwdude

I've become super-careful and sensitive to online security threats in recent years, through personal experience an those who I love.

One question I have advanced is the wisdom of "unsubscribing" to various junk emails from senders who I have no idea how I've been connected to in the first place. Many of them are political emails, which I can understand, since these orgs get names from databases in political donations and party affiliations.

I will readily unsubscribe from org e-mailings I'm familiar with, but what about mystery ones? I'm very reticent to click on ANY link without knowing exactly what I'm doing. An 'unsubscribe' link might just be an opening for malware.

Any thoughts?


TOPICS: Chit/Chat; Computers/Internet
KEYWORDS: email; junkemail; okthen; spam
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To: Bob434
I’m thinking that one might unsubscribe and then receive a ton of new spam emails as a result.

Recently happened to me.

A better way to manage those might be to create an email rule that automatically deletes the address of that site

Yup. I'm now blocking senders on my end.

21 posted on 03/14/2024 8:12:22 AM PDT by null and void (There’s only one thing that’s for sure. Everyone on all sides a conflict will be happy to lie to you)
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To: silent majority rising

That is true. I’m runnin into emails where I go to block a keyword in the “from” headline, like say “dewalt”, and it won’t recognize the from keyword- somehow they hide their “from” title from keyword blockers, so I have to block the ip as address for that larticular sender, but of course they change their address rapidly, so I have to keep blocking them. I did block something, I can’t remeber what now, their domain perhaps? As it got so annoying


22 posted on 03/14/2024 8:15:00 AM PDT by Bob434
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To: fwdude

No. Never, ever do that.

I get 10-12 emails a day from unrecognized “spam” senders. I just delete them. Granted, I have several email addresses that I use for specific website access... mylowes@emailprovider.com, hdepot@emailprovider.com, craigslist99@emailprovider.com, contactme@emailprovider.com ...so I’m probably my own worst enemy because those are the ones I get the spam garbage from. But, I never respond to an email unless it’s from the real website...Lowe’s, Home Depot, Craigslist, etc. I’m in the process of narrowing that down to just one or two emails. So far, it’s been very easy to identify to “spam” emails, and then delete them. Are they phishing emails? Probably.

I have a couple gmail email addresses that I get zero spam from.

Just delete the unrecognized ones.


23 posted on 03/14/2024 8:22:42 AM PDT by moovova ("The NEXT election is the most important election of our lifetimes!“ LOL...)
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To: fwdude

“Block” works better.


24 posted on 03/14/2024 8:28:01 AM PDT by HIDEK6 (God bless Donald Trump. A)
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To: SamAdams76

Yep Trump’s people are absolute predators. They got my cell phone number and I’ve probably blocked 100 messages from them so they can’t send from that phone number again.

Still it doesn’t help. I quit sending them money over a year ago.

Voting for him but sheesh


25 posted on 03/14/2024 8:35:07 AM PDT by jcon40 (Leftists are usually obnoxious Bullies)
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To: Leaning Right
“When you unsubscribe, you’re telling the junk email’s sender that your email address is a live one. So there’s a good chance you’ll be placed on even more junk lists.”

This is exactly what happens. Best thing to do is simply block the sender.

26 posted on 03/14/2024 8:36:11 AM PDT by Sicon ("All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others." - G. Orwell>)
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To: HIDEK6

Yes, I’ve started blocking the spam ones and the worst offenders. I wonder what that does. Do they receive a reply that I’ve blocked their email address, or does the email just go into a twilight zone?


27 posted on 03/14/2024 8:39:53 AM PDT by fwdude (.When unarmed Americans are locked up for protesting a stolen election, you know it was stolen.)
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To: fwdude

Send them to spam and your email service will soon automatically send them there. Just empty the spam folder regularly.

Do not hit unsubscribe. This shows the emailer that you are there. Just send it to spam. Same same as the supposed “no call” list. Foreign telemarketers use the Federal No Call list to get your phone number. There’s nothing the fed can do about calls from India, etc.


28 posted on 03/14/2024 8:46:15 AM PDT by Seruzawa ("The Political left is the Garden of Eden of incompetence" - Marx the Smarter (Groucho))
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To: fwdude
Political ones are legit, but the laws let them make a new list the second you got off the first one, and keep emailing you from that, until you unsubscribe, then the cycle continues.

It is especially annoying with texts, where you can clearly see the new URLs they provide, every new time you send a “Stop.”

I have given a reasonable amount of money, but WinRed using candidates are the ones who keep having emails and phone numbers passed around—and WinRed’s Privacy Agreement says they will distribute your information, as they see fit. Even contacting their Legal department to follow up on the removal request, as stated on the removal instructions, gets no email from their Legal team to stop the apparent giving/sale of your information.

Candidates using Anedot seem to not abuse your information, in my experience.

I just don't give via WinRed anymore. It is a scam site, with its behavior and lack of respect.

Doubt any candidate using WinRed. Send a check, instead.

From WinRed’s Privacy Statement (Apparently for “Contact Information,” “Political Information,” “Voter Registration Information,” “Contribution Information,” “Demographic information,” “Information That You Post or Submit,” and “Social Media Information.”)

How We May Disclose It: Internally; on our Platform; with page creators, political committees and campaigns; with our business partners; with our service providers; with third parties for marketing purposes;…

We may share this information for cross-contextual marketing purposes with, or sell this information to, our business partners. For more information about your right to opt out, please click here.

When you click “here,” you then get the runaround page that says it's valid for only for a couple states…

29 posted on 03/14/2024 8:47:08 AM PDT by ConservativeMind (Trump: Befuddling Democrats, Republicans, and the Media for the benefit of the US and all mankind.)
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To: fwdude
It's all a crapshoot anyway.   So I say what the who?
30 posted on 03/14/2024 9:00:11 AM PDT by higgmeister (In the Shadow of The Big Chicken! )
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To: fwdude

If you had "subscribed" to the service in the first place, then it is safe to "unsubscribe". But for those who grabbed your email address without your consent and start spamming you, never "unsubscribe" as that will only serve to confirm that they are reaching you. The Mozilla Thunderbird email client has a "Message Rules" facility that you can train to move their spam completely unread into your trash can. Half the problem is that everyone is tied to their phones for email these days, and the phone email apps (intentionally) are not fully featured. My next phone will be a "puri.sm" phone so I can run an unadulterated Thunderbird application on it.


31 posted on 03/14/2024 9:00:36 AM PDT by so_real ( "The Congress of the United States recommends and approves the Holy Bible for use in all schools.")
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To: fwdude

Only unsubscribe to emails from vendors or organizations you signed up for. Anything else will just confirm you read and obey junk emails and you’ll get more. Just delete them. Most I get are when a site will give me 10% off for giving my email. Use the coupon, wait for the first email, then unsubscribe.


32 posted on 03/14/2024 9:05:09 AM PDT by Organic Panic (Democrats. Memories as short as Joe Biden's eyes.)
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To: fwdude

Gmail does a good job of preventing spam and when you click the spam button gmail sometimes has a pop-up asking if you want to mark it “spam” or mark it “spam and also unsubscribe”, that must be for sources that gmail recognizes.

I just mark it spam unless it is a company that I know already has that email address.


33 posted on 03/14/2024 10:01:51 AM PDT by ansel12 ((NATO warrior under Reagan, and RA under Nixon, bemoaning the pro-Russians from Vietnam to Ukraine.))
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To: fwdude

I also use 2 or 3 extensions that keep emailers from knowing that I opened an email.


34 posted on 03/14/2024 10:03:47 AM PDT by ansel12 ((NATO warrior under Reagan, and RA under Nixon, bemoaning the pro-Russians from Vietnam to Ukraine.))
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To: fwdude

Hmmmm..
My email allows me to check (select) an email, then click mark as spam, and it disappears into the spam wormhole (wherever that is)..


35 posted on 03/14/2024 10:30:57 AM PDT by joe fonebone (And the people said NO! The End)
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To: fwdude

You can mark as junk or spam, or filter to your deleted box. The email site can also unsubscribe for you. Usually there’s a link above or below the email. It’s supposed to be safer than clicking on the sender’s own unsubscribe link.


36 posted on 03/14/2024 10:43:48 AM PDT by x
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To: fwdude

Send them to your SPAM folder instead of unsubscribing.


37 posted on 03/14/2024 5:27:11 PM PDT by minnesota_bound (Need more money to buy everything now)
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To: thinden

They have computers that randomly generate email addresses and they send out their “feelers” to these addresses “in the blind” by the millions because there’s virtually no cost in doing so. And if they get a reply, even if it’s an “Unsubscribe,” they know they’ve found a live one.

I never click unsubscribe unless it’s someone I knowingly have had transactions with, or it’s a return address I have verified as legit. I just put the address in the reject list in my local email client.


38 posted on 03/14/2024 8:49:03 PM PDT by threefinger
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