The Spam Recycling Center [SRC] in Chicago, a new anti-spam consumer assistance site that allows consumers to recycle unwanted junk email, said it has collected over 100,000 spam messages in just six weeks of operation.
The spam is being collected, cataloged and will be forwarded to the Federal Trade Commission and shared with spam-filter developers to help create better anti-spam software.
Founded by ChooseYourMail.com and leading anti-spam advocates the Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial Email (CAUCE), SAFEeps and the Forum for Responsible Ethical Email [FREE], the SRC was designed to help netizens fight spam, raise public awareness and promote responsible email marketing practices.
“We are pleased that people have reacted so positively to the SRC and we are already beginning to learn more about the spam problem,” said Ian Oxman, president of ChooseYourMail.com. “Our preliminary look at the database indicates a higher number of unique spam messages collected than we first anticipated. This could mean that the spam problem is even more widespread than we originally believed.”
Visitors to the anti-spam site are given instructions on how to forward their spam and, if they choose, get a featured special offer from a retail sponsor.