Spam has become more than just unwanted or unsolicited email. It can be used for advertisements, scams and identity theft as well as to distribute spyware and trojan downloaders that may be used for denial of service attacks. Road Runner takes Spam very seriously as it can not only negatively affect our customers, but it also can put our ability to provide email service at risk.

Spammers get addresses in a number of ways. Some addresses are taken from forum postings, email lists or randomly generated addresses within a domain. Email lists are another way Spam can get to your inbox. Time Warner Cable and Road Runner does not sell any of our customers' information. However, not all other businesses share this commitment to your privacy. Please read the Privacy Agreements of any Web site requesting your email address before registering on that site. This can help you avoid unwanted emails from that site or their partners. Random address generation, also known as "a dictionary attack", is an automated process where a spammer generates a list of names within an ISP or domain. For instance it could start off with AJones@rr.com and then the program would generate addresses like AllenJones@rr.com or AJohnson1@rr.com and send email to them all.

• Create a unique email address - We recommend that you do NOT use your first or last name as this is an easy target for Spammers and for identity theft reasons.
• Create a Spam email account - Unless you want to receive communications from a Web site, use a Spam email account instead of your real one when registering or otherwise providing your email address to a Web site.
• Watch for opt-out options - Legitimate companies should provide an opt-in/opt-out system in regards to sending you newsletters, ads, and other communications.
• Set up message rules and junk folders - Many email clients come with some type of rules or junk filtering. Going to the help option in your email client can give some information on how to set up these options.

Once you begin receiving Spam, the best way to protect yourself against Spam is to set up a Spam filter for your email. Spam filters work just like they sound - they filter legitimate email from Spam and keep Spam from even reaching your inbox, instead routing it to a Spam folder. There are a variety of Spam filter options out there, and they all work a bit differently. The best course of action is to review some of the solutions on the market, see how they work, and decide which one best meets your needs. You may find that your anti-virus solution already contains a spam-filtering option.

There are two important things to keep in mind when sending a complaint of Spam abuse. First, you must include headers in your complaint so that the originating IP address and actual time stamp may be found. Second, the complaint must be submitted to the Internet Service Provider (ISP) that owns the IP address the Spam is coming from, which may or may not be Road Runner.

If you have received unsolicited e-mail it is important first to confirm/verify you have not subscribed to any list from that company. If you have subscribed, please follow the unsubscribe instructions within in the e-mail to be removed from the list. If you have not subscribed, here is what you should do. First you must first discover where the "Internet Headers" are located for that particular e-mail program you are using. In Outlook Express or Outlook you can right mouse click the e-mail message in the "Inbox" and select "Properties". In Microsoft Outlook you can also right mouse click on the e-mail message and select "Options" which will show you the "Internet Headers".

Here is an example of what an "Internet Header" will look like:

Received: from txmx01.mgw.rr.com ([24.93.35.210])

by Mail.austin.rr.com

with Microsoft SMTPSVC(5.5.1877.537.53);

Mon, 18 Jun 2001 15:37:07 -0500

Received: from ndsweb.nongshim.co.kr

([203.249.171.20])

by txmx01.mgw.rr.com (8.11.4/8.11.4)

with ESMTP id f5IKakx19861

for ;

Mon, 18 Jun 2001 15:36:46 -0500 (CDT)

Received: from nsfwz2 (root@[172.16.1.66])

by ndsweb.nongshim.co.kr (8.9.3/) with

SMTP id FAA0000388041;

Tue, 19 Jun 2001 05:29:10 +0900 (KST)

From: Personsendingtheemail@eghotmail.com

Message-ID:

<0000315f237e$00006640$000048c4@mc2.law5.hotmail.com>

To: Undisclosed.Recipients@nongshim.co.kr

Subject: Entrepreneurs only please

Date: Mon, 18 Jun 2001 14:20:55 -0600

MIME-Version: 1.0

Content-Type: text/html;

charset="iso-8859-1"

Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable

X-Priority: 3

X-MSMail-Priority: Normal

Return-Path: spammer@eghotmail.com

After you discover where the "Internet Headers" are, cut and paste them into an e-mail message and forward to abuse@the ISP responsible.com. For example if you look at the "Internet Headers" above, you will notice if we wanted to send a complaint to the appropriate ISP responsible for this email, we would send it to abuse@nongshim.co.kr. Almost all ISP's have an automated response letter when they receive your complaint, however if you do not receive one, do not be discouraged, they are processing your complaint and will notify you if they need more information.

If you are having difficulty locating a contact email for the ISP that the unsolicited mail originated from, try one of these two Web sites: http://www.arin.net/whois or http://www.abuse.net.