This is an excellent message that ABSOLUTELY applies to ALL of us who send e-mails. Please read the short letter below, even if you’re sure you already follow proper procedures.

 Do you really know how to forward e-mails? 50% of us do; 50%DO NOT.

 Do you wonder why you get viruses or junk mail? Do you hate it?

 Every time you forward an e-mail there is information left over from the people who got the message before you, namely their e-mail addresses & names. As the messages get forwarded along, the list of addresses builds, and builds, and builds, and all it takes is for some poor sap to get a virus, and his or computer can send that virus to every e-mail address that has come across his computer. Or, someone can take all of those addresses and sell them or send junk mail to them in hopes that you will go to the site and he will make five cents for each hit. That’s right, all of that inconvenience over a nickel!

 How do you stop it? Well, there several easy steps : (1) ALWAYS hit your Forward button from the actual e-mail you are reading. Ever get those e-mails that you have to open ten pages to read the one page with the information on it? Just to see what you sent. (2) When you forward an e-mail, DELETE all of the other addresses that appear in the body of the message (at the top). That’s right DELETE them. Highlight them and delete them, backspace them, cut them, whatever it is you know how to do. It only takes a second. You must click the “Forward” button first; you won’t be able to edit the message at all.

(3) Whenever you send an e-mail to more than one person do NOT use the To : or Cc : fields for adding e-mail addresses. Always use the BBC : (blind carbon copy) field for listing the e-mail address. If you don’t see your BBC : option click on where it says To : and your address list will appear. Highlight the address and choose BCC : and that’s it, it’s that easy. When you send to BCC : your message will automatically say “Undisclosed Recipients” in the “To :” field of the people who receive it. (4) Remove any “FW :” in the subject line. You can re-name the subject if you wish or even fix spelling. (5) Have you ever gotten an email that is a petition? It states a position and asks you to add your name and address and forward it to 10 or 15 people or your entire address book. The email can be forwarded on and on and can collect thousands of names and email addresses. A FACT : The completed petition is actually worth a couple of bucks to a professional spammer because of the wealth of valid names and email addresses contained therein. If you want to support the petition, send it as your own personal letter to the intended recipient. Your position may carry more weight as a personal letter than a laundry list of names and email address on a petition. (Actually, if you think about it who’s supposed to send the petition in to whatever cause it supports? And don’t believe the ones that say that the email is being traced, it just ain’t so! (6) One of the main ones I hate is the ones that say that something like, “send this email to 10 people and you’ll see something great run across your screen.” Or, sometimes they’ll just tease you by saying something really cute will happen IT AIN’T GONNA HAPPEN!!!!!! (Trust me, I’m still seeing some of the same ones that I waited on 10 years ago!) I don’t let the bad luck ones scare me either, they get trashed. (Could be why I haven’t won the lottery??) (7) Before you forward an Amber Alert, or a Virus Alert, or some of the other ones floating around nowadays, check them out before you forward them. Most of them are junk mail that’s been circling the net for YEARS! Just about everything you receive in an email that is in question can be checked out at Snopes. Just go to http://www.snopes.com or http://www.truthorfixtion.com or any one of the many other web sites devoted to exposing hoaxes.

 It’s really easy to find out if it’s real or not. If it’s not, please don’t pass it on.

 So please, in the future, let’s stop the junk mail and the viruses.

Finally, here’s an idea!!! Let’s send this to every one we know (but strip my address off first, please.) This is something that SHOULD be forwarded. I hadn’t seen this before what a great e-mail lesson!!

This article has been provided to APCUG by the author solely for publication by APCUG member groups. All other uses require the permission of the author.