The Half-Life Of Spam
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How long does spam take to decay into nothing?
I’ve got an old email account, one that I’ve had for about five or six years now, that currently gets roughly 150 or so emails every three days or so (that’s how often I check it). Every single one of them is spam. There hasn’t been a legit message on that account in probably two years now.
It’s been even longer since I’ve sent an email using that address or used it to sign up for something on a website somewhere, probably closer to three and a half years.
You’d think that with all that inactivity the spam would have slowed to a dribble as the account never has never yielded so much as a single click on any of the various targeted links in those mails but they’re still coming.
I will say though that the amount of it has dropped off over time. Two years ago that account was getting over 500 messages over three days. Probably the main reason I keep it anymore is to see how long it takes for the spam to simply die off completely. The only thing I ever do with it is download the mail, look it over in a text-only mail reader and then delete it.
So far, from the look of my experience, I’d have to say that the half life of spam is at least four years or so, perhaps longer. I’m wondering if anyone else has any similar experience with ancient email addresses?
Technorati Tags: unused email account, spam, email, decay, old email account, half life
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