If you are taking the trouble to read this, you probably already know the annoyance (and cost) caused by unwanted emails coming into your mailbox.
Basically, we (as your ISP) are unable to control the activities of spammers unless they actually attempt to spam from our network or are using one of our services or dial-up accounts.
There are things we should know and things we can all do which will help to limit and maybe even eliminate much spam...

Typically, the spammers operate in such a way as to be largely untraceable and difficult to stop. Even when they appear to reasonable (using words like 'you have subscribed to this mailing list' or suggesting that you can easily get off the list by following a certain course of action) the reality usually turns out to be different. The fact is that very few people would have opted to receive their junk email in the first place and the suggested method of getting off the 'mailing list' never seems to work!
We strongly recommend that you NEVER reply to spam and NEVER follow instructions (eg. visiting some website/link) because in many cases, this is simply a method of verifying that yours is a legitimate email address! That is, you will get even more unwanted email...

Apart from the obvious annoyance that spam causes the final recipient, wasting time, bandwidth and often obscuring legitimate email messages, spam is also a serious problem in the load that it places on mail servers and network infrastructure. In many cases a spam attack is likely to have a similar effect to a malicious Denial of Service attack, interfering with the normal operations of the internet.

There are a number of methods used by spammers, the most common are:

• The highly inefficient 'blanket' guessing or generating of email addresses. They simply pick a domain name then generate thousands of possible email addresses. It doesn't matter to these unscrupulous criminals that mail servers and networks around the world waste resources bouncing the many dud email addresses generated.
• Lists of email addresses captured from websites (eg. contact information) News group postings, chat room sites and certain web sites which make money by selling the email addresses obtained in competitions or subscriptions.

• Be very careful when giving out your email address on the internet. This includes chat (irc) groups, usenet news groups and of course, the many web sites that ask you to supply an email address in order to qualify to see part of the site or enter a competition or whatever.
• Do not put your email address on your personal or business website and don't let anyone else do it for you (for example, the cousin who has put up a family tree complete with contact details!).
• Avoid getting infected with any viruses or emailed worms as some of these will harvest your email address as well as those in your address book! (Try to make sure that your email correspondents are similarly careful too...)
• If your email address is already 'out there' we can arrange to change your login name and hence your email address. The problem with this is that you will have to let everyone know that your address has changed! If you wish to change your login name please contact our office in writing.
• Choose a slightly complex email address, such as 'johnt@netlink.com.au' rather than just 'john@netlink.com.au'. We are now finding that spammers are simply 'trying their luck' by using a program to generate possible email addresses just by combining common first names with the ISP or company domain name. We commonly see a list of addresses in our logs like 'jim@domain', 'steve@domain', 'jill@domain' etc...
• You can use client email software which, if correctly configured will filter out much (probably not all) of the spam mail. For example, Mozilla Thunderbird has built-in 'smart' spam filtering and others (such as Eudora) have filter or message rules that allow you to exclude mail which contains the words 'special offer' or 'you must read this!' or whatever...
• Complain directly to all relevant organisations (it is illegal in some parts of the world to send spam)
• Boycott the business AND the product which is being promoted/advertised in the offending email (and encourage others to do so).

Terms and Conditions
We actively discourage spamming and it is against the terms and conditions applying to all our customers. Under the terms and conditions of use, Netlink customers:

• Must not send unsolicited emails to individuals or lists
• If operating a mail server, must ensure that it does not allow relaying by third parties (a favourite ploy of spammers to hide their origins)

Mail Server Blocking
We have configured our mail server to use external blocking lists which include sites or groups of sites which either harbour spammers or allow their mail servers to be used as open relays.

• Open relay database Ordb
• Other sources of spam including misconfigured proxies CBL (Composite Blocking List)
• List of currently known spamming sites Spamhaus

Also, if we are able to identify the originating network (ie. ISP or corporation) we always forward a copy to the administrator's of that network asking them to take action against the offender. Only the administrator of that network is able to find the true identity of the culprit. Most other ISP's also have policies against spamming (not all 'though - particularly overseas).

Do NOT forward spam to Netlink, unless you are being actively targetted with a large volume of abusive mail from a common source.

The unfortunate fact is that we cannot guarantee that we can stop any spammer or spamming site from offending. We believe that a combination of measures as outlined here, together with a concerted world-wide effort to stamp out spam is the best course...