Opting Out Increases Spam?

Slashdot | Opting Out Increases Spam?: ‘I used to ignore spam but recently I have been using the opt-out feature. Now I get more spam than ever, especially of the Nigerian scam (and related) types. The latter has gone from almost none to several a day. Was I a fool for opting out? Is my email address being harvested when I opt out? Has anybody had similar experience?’

I saw this posting on Slashdot and thought it would be a good chance to educate everyone about this. Unless you specifically subscribed to something, the ‘opt out’ feature should never, ever be used. A lot of spammers use this ruse to verify your email address so they (and others who they sell their email lists to) can send more spam. Its really a pretty old trick but one that is not often talked about.

If spam is a problem, I suggest you use either the built-in anti-spam features of your email application or service instead.