4C Software & Technology Directory

IT departments at businesses of all sizes have to deal with the headaches associated with spam emails flooding the In boxes of their employees. In many cases, these messages are nothing more than harmless advertisements or newsletters. But in some instances, “spam” email can be much more insidious. It can carry a virus that will attack a user’s computer or the entire network, often giving hackers the ability to access critical information.

The dangers of spam emails are real and IT departments take steps to protect their networks through the use of technology such as “spam filters” that weed out likely spam messages. But while filters will catch many spam messages, they won’t filter out all of them. Employees who frequently use email need to understand the steps they can take to root out spam messages:

Steps include:

Reading email addresses of senders: Email spammers will frequently attempt to fool the people receiving their messages by using a fake “from” email address that looks similar to those from real companies. Keep in mind that a company such as Microsoft will never use a domain of “Microsoft.co” or “MicrosoftIT.com” to send an email to you.

Checking for misspellings: Real corporate emails have typically been read and copy edited to ensure that every word is perfect. If you notice obvious spelling or grammar errors in the copy of an email that you receive, be very careful. Either the person sending the email was sloppy or you have received spam.

Watching out for deceitful links: One of the main things that a spammer wants you to do is click on one of the links in their email. It could take you to a sales page or to a site with harmful viruses. Hover over any link before you click on it – this gives you the ability to review the website address. If the website address looks suspicious or has a lot of characters, be wary.