Q: While reading a Facebook article, I encountered a repeating pop-up box saying I had won a $500 Amazon gift card. When I couldn't get rid of the box, I finally clicked on it and completed part of the survey required to get the card.
I haven't gotten the gift card, but I have received more than 600 spam e-mails, most of them dealing with pornography. I've tried unsubscribing to each of them — sometimes I've been successful, but other times I've gotten a "mail delivery failure" message for the unsubscribe request. Is there any way to stop the spam?
Patty Bohn, Wernersville, Pa.
A: There's no way to completely eliminate spam, but you can minimize it by not clicking on questionable online offers and not trying to unsubscribe from spam e-mail. It also helps to refer spam messages to your e-mail provider's spam-filtering software and to use pop-up blocking software.
Online offers of the too-good-to-be-true variety are typically bait to obtain your personal information, such as your e-mail address. Responding to them is likely to increase the amount of spam you receive.
Trying to unsubscribe to spam is a waste of time and is likely to increase the amount of unwanted mail you receive. A spammer will see an unsubscribe request as confirmation that you received his or her message and acted on it. That means that a) your e-mail address works, and b) you might respond to future offers contained in junk e-mail. As a result, you receive more spam.
Because you use Gmail, you should refer spam messages to its "junk" mail folder, which is used to update its spam-blocking software. Gmail's spam filter already stops a lot of unwanted mail from reaching your inbox, and by alerting it to spam it missed you can broaden its filtering efforts. Click the box next to a spam e-mail, then click the "report spam" button, which is to the left of the "trash" icon and is a stop sign with an exclamation point.
To prevent getting unwanted pop-ups, use a "pop-up blocker" with your browser. (To find pop-up blocker add-ons for several popular browsers, see tinyurl.com/y7tf4g48). To get rid of any pop-up software that's already on your computer, download and run the free version of Malwarebytes (see tinyurl.com/jsdacdk).