What is spam?

Spam is the term given to Unsolicited Commercial Email (UCE) - it is also sometimes known as Unsolicited Bulk Email (UBE).

Spam creates many problems:

1. It greatly increases costs for ISP's (which will end up being passed on to their customers).

2. Spam is nearly free for spammers to send - the receiver is the one that wastes a lot of time (and more money) downloading and dealing with it.

3. Mail servers become congested and spam will be responsible for some mail delivery delays.

4. Spam filters will incorrectly identify a proportion of legitimate mail as spam - see: Anti-Spam Software.

5. Spam is often linked to other criminal activity / computer misuse - viruses are often written to infect computers and extract information or send spam - a lot of spam is for phishing schemes where they try to trick you into entering your personal / bank login information.

It causes mail servers to become congested and will be responsible for some mail delivery delays.

SPAM (in capitals) is also a registered trademark of Hormel Foods Corporation for their for their luncheon meat product.

The term "spam" arose from Monty Python's Flying Circus - first shown by the BBC on 15th December 1970. In one scene a group of Vikings sang a chorus of 'Spam, Spam, Spam, Spam, Lovely Spam, Wonderful Spam...' drowning out all other conversation. So spam was used because UCE was drowning out normal email traffic on the Internet.