Tips for avoiding spam
New Zealand’s Unsolicited Electronic Messages Act 2007 was created to help stop spammers by creating a safe and secure electronic environment for businesses and the community.
Stopping spam and malicious activity caused by spam requires multiple avenues of resource such as infrastructure, legislation and regulation. But spam and any associated harm can also be mitigated by being a savvy computer user.
General advice
- Consider using different email addresses for your various online accounts. For instance you might have one email address for shopping online and a different address for online news groups.
- Do not to link all your electronic addresses together (known as “daisy chaining”). If one address is compromised in the chain it may be possible to compromise additional associated addresses.
- Provide your personal email address only to people and organisations you know and trust. If you must give out your email address, consider your options such as using a separate account for that particular service.
- Ensure you understand what you are agreeing to online when subscribing to a service, making a purchase or downloading an application. Ensure that you have marked any check boxes appropriately, carefully reading any associated terms and conditions.
- Only download applications from trusted sources.
- Beware of emails from an unknown or dubious source. Never open email attachments or click hyperlinks included in a message that you were not expecting, or were sent from an unknown sender.
- Never provide personal or financial information such as passwords or credit card information to an unknown or untrusted person or website.
- Use strong, unique passwords for each of your accounts and include two-factor authentication where possible.
- Report spam messages. Once reported you can delete or mark the message as spam in your account.
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