SUPER SLOW EMAIL
09/11/2008 01:41 Filed in: Shihan's
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How fast is the internet when it takes FIVE
DAYS for an email to travel TWO MILES to its
destination?
I received an email yesterday (November 8th) from a
Hotmail account that was sent on November 3rd. It was
a relatively important email which I should have
replied to as soon as possible ... an inquiry from a
prospective student.
But it took FIVE DAYS for an email sent from Camborne to reach me in Illogan - a distance of about 2 miles!
Why? Because the internet is clogged up with spam and hoax emails.
My ISP has quite a good anti spam filter, and last time I bothered to look there were nearly 2,000 emails for me in the spam mailbox ... not to mention the 100 or so a day that manage to get past the spam filters and actually reach my computer.
Many of these are emails trying to get my bank details by sending me to a false web site pretending to be eBay/ PayPal/ just about every bank/ financial institution you can think of.
Others offer me a variety of "services", ranging from meeting people of the opposite (sometimes same) sex, various "medications" to improve my manliness, and gambling services.
All get deleted without being read.
I have been sent various malware - viruses and spyware for example, but fortunately I use an Apple Mac so they don't work on my computer... but they do clog up my Inbox and the internet, and I'd hate to send them on to someone who could be affected by them.
All the above are malicious emails, intended to do harm. What is sad is the number of hoax emails that go around which don't really do much in the way of "damage" other than wasting your time, wasting your friends time and clogging up the phone lines with tat.
Recently I have had a number of hoax emails forwarded on to me (and a bunch of other people).
For example ...
A household name British Company is giving away free £500 vouchers if you forward the email to 20 people (http://www.hoax-slayer.com/marks-spencer-voucher-hoax.shtml)
A young girl dying of cancer will be paid 32¢/10p for every 3+ people you forward it on to (http://www.hoax-slayer.com/rachel-arlington-charity-hoax.html)
AOL/Microsoft are paying various amounts to track emails for beta testing/marketing purposes (http://www.hoax-slayer.com/ms-money-giveway-hoax.html)
I have to put my hand up here and admit that I have been caught out in the past by hoax emails and happily and blindly forward them on in good faith ...
However, there are some really sad aspects to this type of email.
[1] the vast majority of people will forward them on to their friends "en masse" with the best of intentions. What could be more friendly than helping someone get some extra money for something as simple as forwarding on a few emails? I can't get angry with anyone who sends me a hoax email as they are trying to be nice to me, but sooner or later that person will feel a little foolish when they realise that they have not only been hoaxed but have perpetuated that hoax on their friends.
[2] hoax emails clog up the internet. Do the maths ...
DAY 1 - You forward an email to 20 people.
DAY 2 - Those 20 people each send the email on to 20 more people (400 people)
DAY 3 - Those 400 people each send the email on to 20 more people (8,000 people)
DAY 4 - Those 8,000 people each send the email on to 20 more people (160,000 people)
DAY 5 - Those 160,000 people each send the email on to 20 more people (3,200,000 people)
DAY 6 - Those 3,200,000 people each send the email on to 20 more people (64,000,000 people)
DAY 7 - Those 64,000,000 people each send the email on to 20 more people (1,280,000,000 people)
That is more than ONE AND A QUARTER BILLION emails in ONE WEEK that are a direct result of ONE PERSON sending out ONE EMAIL.
You'd be surprised at just how old some of these are, and they are still circulating the internet YEARS after being created - how many billions of emails would that be?
[3] Often the hoax emails ask you to do something as well as forward the emails, such as send get well cards to a particular person in hospital or send copies of the emails to a particular person. One hospital in America was getting hundreds of thousands of get well cards a day from all over the world, all addressed to someone who didn't exist - how easy would it be for an important letter to get lost in such a mass of incoming mail? Imagine what it would be like if the hoax email had your email address as the "forward a copy to" address ... how would you cope with millions of emails downloading to your PC every day?
[4] when a hoax email arrives it usually includes a huge list of other people that it was sent on to. I have received hoax emails with over 500 "forwarded to" addresses in them. If I was a spammer in the business of sending out several million emails a day to promote my casino/ medications/ dating site receiving a hoax email would be like Christmas to me! More email addresses that I can use to send out my viruses, spyware, phishing emails, adverts for Viagra etc. AND, I can also sell them on to other spammers so they can use your email address again and again to send you more and more junk emails.
In short, spam and hoax emails waste everyone's time and clog up the internet to the extent that it can take days to get emails delivered instead of minutes.
Learn to spot the fake emails. Visit a site such as http://www.hoax-slayer.com/ and read up about the various types of fake emails. Take 5 minutes to read just the front page of http://www.hoax-slayer.com/ and you will be able to spot the majority of fake emails easily. Check out the rest of the site if you can be bothered, it's fascinating reading.
If you get an email asking you to forward it to a number of your friends DON'T DO IT! Delete it and you'll be actively helping to cut down the number of hoax emails on the internet. Even think twice about forwarding "good stuff" such as really good jokes ... it's polite to check with the person first to see if they actually want to receive them (me, I always like good jokes so send them on!).
If you want to forward this email to your friends it may be a good idea - but I will understand completely if you decide not to!!!!
As I said earlier, I can't get annoyed with people who send me hoax emails as they are trying to be nice to me. What I want to do now is to be nice to you (and anyone else who reads this) by helping you to spot future fake emails and know how to deal with them.
Hopefully, we may be able to cut down on the number of junk emails by the tiniest amount, and I may get some of my emails delivered a few days earlier!
But it took FIVE DAYS for an email sent from Camborne to reach me in Illogan - a distance of about 2 miles!
Why? Because the internet is clogged up with spam and hoax emails.
My ISP has quite a good anti spam filter, and last time I bothered to look there were nearly 2,000 emails for me in the spam mailbox ... not to mention the 100 or so a day that manage to get past the spam filters and actually reach my computer.
Many of these are emails trying to get my bank details by sending me to a false web site pretending to be eBay/ PayPal/ just about every bank/ financial institution you can think of.
Others offer me a variety of "services", ranging from meeting people of the opposite (sometimes same) sex, various "medications" to improve my manliness, and gambling services.
All get deleted without being read.
I have been sent various malware - viruses and spyware for example, but fortunately I use an Apple Mac so they don't work on my computer... but they do clog up my Inbox and the internet, and I'd hate to send them on to someone who could be affected by them.
All the above are malicious emails, intended to do harm. What is sad is the number of hoax emails that go around which don't really do much in the way of "damage" other than wasting your time, wasting your friends time and clogging up the phone lines with tat.
Recently I have had a number of hoax emails forwarded on to me (and a bunch of other people).
For example ...
A household name British Company is giving away free £500 vouchers if you forward the email to 20 people (http://www.hoax-slayer.com/marks-spencer-voucher-hoax.shtml)
A young girl dying of cancer will be paid 32¢/10p for every 3+ people you forward it on to (http://www.hoax-slayer.com/rachel-arlington-charity-hoax.html)
AOL/Microsoft are paying various amounts to track emails for beta testing/marketing purposes (http://www.hoax-slayer.com/ms-money-giveway-hoax.html)
I have to put my hand up here and admit that I have been caught out in the past by hoax emails and happily and blindly forward them on in good faith ...
However, there are some really sad aspects to this type of email.
[1] the vast majority of people will forward them on to their friends "en masse" with the best of intentions. What could be more friendly than helping someone get some extra money for something as simple as forwarding on a few emails? I can't get angry with anyone who sends me a hoax email as they are trying to be nice to me, but sooner or later that person will feel a little foolish when they realise that they have not only been hoaxed but have perpetuated that hoax on their friends.
[2] hoax emails clog up the internet. Do the maths ...
DAY 1 - You forward an email to 20 people.
DAY 2 - Those 20 people each send the email on to 20 more people (400 people)
DAY 3 - Those 400 people each send the email on to 20 more people (8,000 people)
DAY 4 - Those 8,000 people each send the email on to 20 more people (160,000 people)
DAY 5 - Those 160,000 people each send the email on to 20 more people (3,200,000 people)
DAY 6 - Those 3,200,000 people each send the email on to 20 more people (64,000,000 people)
DAY 7 - Those 64,000,000 people each send the email on to 20 more people (1,280,000,000 people)
That is more than ONE AND A QUARTER BILLION emails in ONE WEEK that are a direct result of ONE PERSON sending out ONE EMAIL.
You'd be surprised at just how old some of these are, and they are still circulating the internet YEARS after being created - how many billions of emails would that be?
[3] Often the hoax emails ask you to do something as well as forward the emails, such as send get well cards to a particular person in hospital or send copies of the emails to a particular person. One hospital in America was getting hundreds of thousands of get well cards a day from all over the world, all addressed to someone who didn't exist - how easy would it be for an important letter to get lost in such a mass of incoming mail? Imagine what it would be like if the hoax email had your email address as the "forward a copy to" address ... how would you cope with millions of emails downloading to your PC every day?
[4] when a hoax email arrives it usually includes a huge list of other people that it was sent on to. I have received hoax emails with over 500 "forwarded to" addresses in them. If I was a spammer in the business of sending out several million emails a day to promote my casino/ medications/ dating site receiving a hoax email would be like Christmas to me! More email addresses that I can use to send out my viruses, spyware, phishing emails, adverts for Viagra etc. AND, I can also sell them on to other spammers so they can use your email address again and again to send you more and more junk emails.
In short, spam and hoax emails waste everyone's time and clog up the internet to the extent that it can take days to get emails delivered instead of minutes.
Learn to spot the fake emails. Visit a site such as http://www.hoax-slayer.com/ and read up about the various types of fake emails. Take 5 minutes to read just the front page of http://www.hoax-slayer.com/ and you will be able to spot the majority of fake emails easily. Check out the rest of the site if you can be bothered, it's fascinating reading.
If you get an email asking you to forward it to a number of your friends DON'T DO IT! Delete it and you'll be actively helping to cut down the number of hoax emails on the internet. Even think twice about forwarding "good stuff" such as really good jokes ... it's polite to check with the person first to see if they actually want to receive them (me, I always like good jokes so send them on!).
If you want to forward this email to your friends it may be a good idea - but I will understand completely if you decide not to!!!!
As I said earlier, I can't get annoyed with people who send me hoax emails as they are trying to be nice to me. What I want to do now is to be nice to you (and anyone else who reads this) by helping you to spot future fake emails and know how to deal with them.
Hopefully, we may be able to cut down on the number of junk emails by the tiniest amount, and I may get some of my emails delivered a few days earlier!