Spam is unsolicited bulk email. Not all bulk email is spam. Not all commercial email is spam. Email must be unsolicited and bulk in order to be spam. Unsolicited email is email the recipient did not (explicitly or implicitly) agree to receive. If the recipient agreed to receive it, then it is not spam.

This is one negative aspect we all need to learn to deal with from time to time when using the Internet. Running a business on the Internet can also make you more vulnerable to spamming. The more spam we receive the more we wish to place a stop to it.

Misreporting Spam:

One thing you must understand before reporting spam from within your in box is our email addresses we set up for your website uses a simple forwarder. That means any email sent to your business website hosted with us is automatically sent from your business email account to your personal ISP email account.  That means you are sending yourself the email from your business domain.

EX: Your business email info@yourcitydirectory.com is forwarded to yourname@aol.com

If you receive a spam email to info@yourcitydirectory.com, this account will now send the same email to yourname@aol.com.

If you report this email to your ISP, it will look at the LAST SENDING SERVER, which in most cases will be YOU (info@yourcitydirectory.com)! This is who the ISP will place on a spam block, not the originating sender.

Erroneous reports lead to the unjust and unfair action of our IP address(es) to be placed on blacklists or to have ISP's block all mail sent from our servers from ever reaching their clients. Even if the email being sent is legitimate! It can also lead to suspension or termination of the reported account.

What can you do?

Before reporting spam email, be sure it was not sent to your city directory account before reaching your ISP in box. If it was, chose to delete it, block it or look for an unsubscribe link within the email to stop new emails from this sender from coming.

Consider removing the forwarder email we set up when your site was constructed and instead set up a POP email account within your Hosting Cpanel. You can then read / send mail directly from your Hosting Cpanel, or use a program such as Outlook Express or Incredimailaccount Watch to manage your email from your business website.

What happens if my account is reported for spamming?

First we will attempt to warn you of the incident, however, this may not always be possible if the spamming offense is very serious and numerous complaints are received. We may be forced to terminate your account or possibly move your account to a separate IP address, in which case a *monthly charge of $15 will be necessary for the lease of the new IP.

* This fee is subject to change at any time.

I did not spam, but I was reported. Why?

Possible reasons are located below:

• You are using auto-responses that are replying to spam with forged spamtrap email
  addresses (such as Out-of-Office/Vacation notices, virus notifications, and 'bounces' created after accepting the email);
• You have a computer with a virus that sends spam without your knowledge;
• You have  a computer that has been compromised and spammers are remotely controlling it to transmit their spew;
• You are reporting your own emails forwarded from your business website to your ISP as spam;
• or because, as in all systems, there may have been a mistake. (very rare)

What is a blocklist?

An ISP can use a blocklist (a list of IP addresses), to reject all email coming from a particular IP address. This rejection will cause the ISP to send you what is called a "bounce" message. The blocking is based not on your email address (which looks like username[at]example.com), but on the IP address (which looks something like 67.162.250.4).

If you or another client is sending/accused of sending spam through our mail server, it will cause the IP address of the mail server to be put on the blocklist. And when you send email through our server, ISP’s who use blocklists to avoid receiving spam, will block your email.