Slashdot Mirror

When I first heard of Outbox (here?), I quickly submitted my email address to them to be notified when it hit my city.

I unsubscribe from nearly every mailing I can manually, as well as use the Direct Marketing Associations's Mail Preference Service and a 5-year blackout from credit card companies.

You can reach all of these from: https://www.dmachoice.org/

---

And I still get junk. They're all assholes.

If you want to opt-out of direct mailing, not only do you have to give them your personal information, they charge $1 for it! The actual site: https://www.dmachoice.org/

Found some old recommendations I sent out to friends that weren't too tek savvy. It's fairly basic info that most should know.

I was looking into Life Lock and started reading what they actually do, which is in the fine print of their terms of service here.

http://www.dmachoice.org/ it's the primary service Life Lock uses to get you off of mailing lists and it's free. They also have some good info on how to keep secure online. There are several items you can go through to have your self removed form email and mail lists.

Then go to https://www.donotcall.gov/ and register your phone numbers for the do not call list.

Then go to https://www.optoutprescreen.com/ to remove your self from the credit card pre-approval lists.

If you want free credit reports use this site. https://www.annualcreditreport.com/cra/index.jsp You can get 1 free report every year from each of the 3 reporting agencies. If you break it up you could get 1 every 2 month. I could get one from Equifax this month. Then in 2 months my wife could get one for them. Then in 2 months I could get one from TransUnion. etc... The reason to get them is mostly to see who has been looking at your credit. Then make sure all the loans are yours.

Now for your online stuff. Get an email account at google or some place else that you can use for those online registration things that you need to do from time to time. Use that account only for things that you are unsure about. Keep another account for the more important stuff like the banks. You could even have a 3rd account for your general email.

Most web browsers have an option too clear the cache and cookies. Look for it. In Safari on Mac look under the Safari menu then select Reset Safari... On Windows it's under the File Menu. In Firefox you need to look in the Preferences and the Security tab. Resetting and clearing out the cookies will also clear saved passwords. The reason to do this is because many web sites set tokens on your web browser called cookies that allow them to track you and what you do online. They can see where you are going and what you do online. For Windows this is a big problem because there are ways to install applications on the system without you knowing. Then your computer can be used to send email spam to others or even be used remotely to take over other computers. This is really only a problem on Windows but for Macs they can still track your online usage and figure things out about you that might make it easier to get you to click on something that would install an application that could take over your computer.

For email. Set your email program to not automatically read your mail and try to use the built-in spam filters. Also set the options to not download in-line pictures and such. The pictures in spam can be used to also track you and verify your email address. If you and I get the same piece of spam the picture will actually not be in the email it's actually a picture on a web server someplace. The name of the picture is unique to each spam email so when your mail program tries to access the picture from the internet the spammers computer ticks off the unique name your computer used to get the picture. That unique name is associated with your email address.

I work for a company which handles analytics and warehousing for few clients for direct marketing. I personally developed parts of the system to filter out various opt-out - like DNC, DDNC, DMP (DMA Mail Preference) - lists from our various DBs. It does help both sides. It's just that in stead of opt-out, it should default to opt-in.

For those unaware, you can register your name/address with DMA opt out, and most of the companies would honor the list - https://www.dmachoice.org/dma/member/regist.action

For pre-approved credit-card offers, you can opt out at https://www.optoutprescreen.com/

Simply by adding my name to these two, I have reduced junk mails by 80-90%.

What if they send you physical junk mail? Can you call the cops then?

Actually you can IF you have gone through the OPT-OUT procedures with the the DMA. It's about as effective as the do-not-call lists (iow: mostly but not 100%). The cops in this case are the DMA, however there's advantages to being a DMA member that make it worth the while to remain compliant.

Just FYI, You can unsubscribe from the mailing lists for free by contacting the credit bureaus directly. There is also a company called DMA that let's you opt-out at https://www.dmachoice.org/MPS/proto1.php

As far as I know there's no universal "don't send me junk mail" program, but there are a couple lists you can sign up for that will dramatically reduce the amount of junk mail you receive.

To get rid of most "pre-approved" credit card offers, there's an official opt-out program. This is free and it does, in fact, work.

To get rid of a bunch of other junk mail (like catalogs etc), you can add yourself to the Direct Marketing Association's opt-out list at their website. This used to cost a small amount ($1, I think), but it's now free--they ask for a credit card number only for verification purposes. I guess they wouldn't want an interested party to suddenly find themselves bereft of junk mail or something.

Between those two, you're pretty much covered. I signed up for both of them and I receive very little unwanted mail.

Funny, this article just reminded me to sign up for the do not mail list. You can find it here.
https://www.dmachoice.org/MPS/mps_consumer_description.php

https://www.dmachoice.org/MPS/mps_consumer_description.php

The mailing list I'm talking about you do have to pay if you mail in the form. Online is free but you have to provide a credit card number for verification. https://www.dmachoice.org/MPS/mps_consumer_description.php