How to beat spam using your existing GMail account

[Owen W Veteran]

I've written a guide on how to beat spam using your existing GMail account:

Step 1: Create a filter in GMail specifying if the mail is sent to “your.address+spam”@gmail.com (or your apps domain - and you can use any word instead of spam. I used “owen+crap@mydomain.com). Hit next.

Step 2: On the next screen, either click “apply label” and create a label for that spam if you do want to catch and keep it, just in case it’s an activation email or something, or tick “Delete it”. Then tick “Skip Inbox”

Step 3: Hit save. You’re done!

All you need to do now, is when you sign up for some undesirable site, type in the email address that you specified in the filter. So for myself, I would type “owen+crap@mydomain.com” and it will all go into the label I specified on GMail. It’s like a whole new email address, but in the safety of your GMail.

You can check out the guide over here on my website too :)

[JimmyCypherz]

Nice.

Thanks

[+Mystic MVC]

I had hoped this topic would help me eliminate my current Gmail spam probably but it looks like this guide is for something slightly different. I registered my gmail account within the year Gmail was created but never signed up/used it ever. Regardless I log into the account weekly to keep it active and there are over 300 spam emails a day in there even though the account was NEVER signed up with anything.

Thanks for the tip nonetheless, I will be using this in the future.

[Lee G. Veteran]

Nice guide, Owen.

I had hoped this topic would help me eliminate my current Gmail spam probably but it looks like this guide is for something slightly different. I registered my gmail account within the year Gmail was created but never signed up/used it ever. Regardless I log into the account weekly to keep it active and there are over 300 spam emails a day in there even though the account was NEVER signed up with anything.

Thanks for the tip nonetheless, I will be using this in the future.

I have the same problem too. I created a filter that automatically sends spam to the trash, so I don't see something like Spam (????) each time I log into my Gmail. I find Gmail's spam filter is very good. If something genuine does get filtered as spam, then at least you can dig through the trash for it.

[Auditor]

why dont people use some junk email address for all these crap purposes.

[+BudMan MVC]

or just use http://trashmail.net/ can be set to only forward specific number of emails, and by default expires in 7 days anyway.

[Minchino]

Or for just signing up to read something http://10minutemail.com gives you an address you can use to sign-up and validate the address then not worry about.

[Bhav]

Pretty cool tip!

Also recommend mailinator.com for temporary email address needs ;)

[endtype]

thanks, useful guide.

[xendrome]

Nice guide, Owen.

I have the same problem too. I created a filter that automatically sends spam to the trash, so I don't see something like Spam (????) each time I log into my Gmail. I find Gmail's spam filter is very good. If something genuine does get filtered as spam, then at least you can dig through the trash for it.

I did this also, but made it "Mark as Read" so it doesn't show a count on the Spam folder.

[Evolution]

Nice guide, Owen.

I have the same problem too. I created a filter that automatically sends spam to the trash, so I don't see something like Spam (????) each time I log into my Gmail. I find Gmail's spam filter is very good. If something genuine does get filtered as spam, then at least you can dig through the trash for it.

I simply have the rule mark all spam as read to avoid the problem ;)

[Nagisan]

I think I may follow the OP's guide.......I like only keeping track of 1 gmail account (I have 5 or possibly even more extra accounts I use for spam), though I can save them in Opera's wand feature, its annoying if I ever want to go to gmail to access older/archived emails. But I do occasionally sign up to sites I would rather not have sending me email/selling my standard email address.

[binoyxj]

Have been doing this for quite sometime. An effective way i would say :)

[gaurav]

why dont people use some junk email address for all these crap purposes.

Thats what I started doing, except now my spam address has become my main address.

[Pupik]

Yeah, because it's impossible for the spam bot "admins" to remove everything after the plus (including the plus), until the at sign... :shifty:

Better to use temp e-mail services like YOPmail, like others here suggested.

[Nagisan]

Yeah, because it's impossible for the spam bot "admins" to remove everything after the plus (including the plus), until the at sign... :shifty:

Better to use temp e-mail services like YOPmail, like others here suggested.

Gmail does a very good job at filtering spam mail. I think I have gotten maybe 2 spam emails in the past 3 months at the most. I have not "lost" any legit emails to the spam filter either to my knowledge.

Plus, currently its unlikely any spam bots remove +whatever from an email name, granted it would be easy to do and will likely become normal once this method of registering at spam sites becomes more used, I doubt something this advanced will catch on with average users, which will delay the need for spam bots to remove the second half of an email address.

[Sir Topham Hatt]

Or for just signing up to read something http://10minutemail.com gives you an address you can use to sign-up and validate the address then not worry about.

I just do this with Yahoo email addresses.

Sign up, activate the account, then never sign back in to Yahoo again.