This is a situation that is a grey area for many. I know from experience, and current spammer counter measures, that it is NOT a local problem that ‘cleaning your computer’ will cure. bcpowell could not have solved the problem by doing what he did. All he did was closed his account, but the spamers had an address they could still use as a spamming ‘from’ address.

I can only stress that it is not on your computer, does not get solved by changing passwords or email addresses.

Firstly, somehow your email address has been ‘validated’ by the spammers.

This is done by a variety of ways, mostly by friends forwarding emails that offer funny jokes, nude pictures, support for cancer patients, soldiers, or ‘send this back if you care’ type of emails. when gets back to them they have a list of valid email addresses to send bogus offers to, and worse still, it’s email addresses you will trust because you know the owner of the email address.

I have a honey trap computer with a yahoo email address, which receives over 40 spam emails a day. Many of them come from my own email address. Yes, they are automated and not checked for give-aways, like me sending me a fantastic job offer. I must be good if I want to hire me.

Once your email address is in the scammers database, expect to receive loads of complaints from friends who think these emails really come from you.