The messages sometimes carry scams and viruses, and they cost users and businesses billions of dollars a year in time and trouble. Most of the cost of e-mail is borne by recipients. And so far the spammers have outwitted everyone trying to fight them. If there were, we would have done it. Fighting spam is a tough job because a single spammer can send millions of automated messages a day.
Spammers also go fishing for new targets by trying variations on e-mail addresses.
The junk mail creators' recent techniques include a more personal style. Some spammers use the subject line in the message to make the recipient think it's legitimate. For someone to come in and alter the setting and force you to go somewhere you don't want to go, they've overstepped here. As spam arrives at those addresses, it is analyzed and the information included in a database. For businesses using Brightmail's system, suspected spam messages are sidetracked into a special folder where customers can read or ignore them.