Guy Is Tired Of Getting Spam Emails Meant For Another Person, Executes Petty Revenge
People who use the internet and email know about spam – those unsolicited messages in your inbox consisting of dubious advertising, demands to disclose your personal information, or requests to send money to an African prince.
However, when Reddit user CrazyIslander noticed there was an increase in these pesky nuisances, he realized that many of them were being redirected by another person. Eventually, the guy managed to track them down and ask them to stop, but his attempt to resolve the issue in a civil manner was ignored.
So he stepped up the measures. Continue scrolling to read his post from the subreddit ‘Petty Revenge,’ detailing the lengths CrazyIslander went to in an attempt to regain his peace of mind.
Most people find spam annoying but consider it an unavoidable side effect of using email
Image credits: Justin Morgan (not the actual photo)
This guy, however, decided to fight it
Image credits: Tima Miroshnichenko (not the actual photo)
Image credits: CrazyIslander
We got in touch with CrazyIslander and he kindly agreed to have a little chat with us about the whole ordeal.
“Simply put, [stuff] happens, and having an email address as straightforward as mine is, you have to expect that it will happen sooner or later,” the Redditor told Bored Panda.
“I will occasionally get emails from people (both male and female) who share the same first initial and last name as I do. G-Man was the exception, though. It happened with him a lot.”
CrazyIslander highlighted it was mostly trivial emails that he had been getting, such as newsletters and straight-up spam.
“It was rare that I got any personal emails that were meant for him, so it was more just a nuisance having to unsubscribe myself from whatever he had gotten signed up for.”
“But as I said in my initial post, I tried to give him the benefit of the doubt and assumed that either G-Man (or someone else) was perhaps making a typo with the email address,” CrazyIslander noted. But as we just learned, that wasn’t the case.
“Had I found information that allowed me to call G-Man, I absolutely would have,” he added.
“Whenever I could, I have reached out to people via email, text, and phone before when an email arrived that wasn’t intended for me. I once received an email for a gentleman named Richard (same last name) that contained enough information in it that I managed to track him down, so I called him.”
Now that all this time has passed, CrazyIslander can’t recall the specifics of that particular instance, but “the email seemed important enough that it warranted me reaching out to him to let him know about it,” which the intended recipient appreciated.
“When I emailed G-Man to advise him that the emails were going to a real person, it was replied to with apologies, so I assumed that it would be the end of the things,” CrazyIslander pointed out once again.
The Redditor could’ve never predicted the thriller that was awaiting him. “I’m only speculating, but I think my revenge tactics had a very long-lasting effect on G-Man’s behavior. The emails I receive that are addressed to him are far and few between compared to what they were. I’m sure once the physical mail started arriving at his place, he realized the severity of his continued stupidity.”
CrazyIslander hasn’t really changed his internet habits or how he protects his email and personal information. “Ironically, I used to work in IT myself, so I’ve always been aware of how to take precautions guarding personal info while browsing the internet.” After all, pretty much all of this was caused by good old human error(s).
Spam continues to be an ongoing challenge for internet users
Today, spam is a term covering a wide variety of cybersecurity threats and unwanted messages by email on your laptop, tablet, or other device.
Estimates of its prevalence vary, largely because people define it differently.
Some surveys place the percentage of email spam at around 45% to 50%, while others say it can be as high as 85%.
The fundamental characteristic of spam is that it’s unwanted, meaning the recipient, just like CrazyIslander, hasn’t granted permission to receive the content.
Even though most email services today filter for spam, it keeps constantly evolving.
Image credits: Stephen Phillips(not the actual photo)
What to do if you too are getting someone else’s emails
If you are facing the same problem as CrazyIslander but aren’t ready to go nuclear, one way you can make your life easier is to set up canned replies so you don’t have to type the same message every time you want to respond to the senders.
Gmail has a template feature where you can quickly save one:
- Click on the gear icon, then select Settings;
- Go to the Templates section on the Advanced tab;
- Select the Enable button, then Save Changes;
- Compose a new message, writing something along the lines of, “Thank you for your email, but unfortunately, you have the wrong email address”;
- On the bottom row of icons in the compose window, click the three dots;
- Choose Templates, then Save draft as template, and name it;
- Now when you write a new email, you can click on the three dots in the compose window and select the template you’ve made.
And in Outlook:
- Compose a new email with your canned response’
- On the File tab, choose Save As and name it;
- Next time you compose a new message, choose the Canned Responses button and select the one you’d like to use.
If that doesn’t stop the onslaught of unwanted emails, another possibility is to set up filters in your inbox. This works if you tend to get messages from the same people but keep in mind it isn’t going to stop new wayward emails, so you’ll need to continue adding people to your “Not For Me” filter.
Here’s how to do it in Gmail:
- Click on the gear icon, then select Settings;
- In the Filters and Blocked Addresses tab, scroll down and click Create a new filter;
- Put the person’s email you want to filter in the “From” field in the box that pops up and hit Create filter;
- Choose the box to delete or archive emails from that person, then click Create filter.
And in Outlook:
- Click the gear icon, then select More mail settings;
- On the Outlook Options page, choose Customizing Hotmail, and then Rules for sorting new messages;
- Click New, and then enter the name of the sender you want to filter;
- Choose the action you’d like to happen (like deleting the email), then hit Save.
The last option is to change your point of view. As annoying as it can be to receive messages for someone else, you can view them as a sort of gift, your very own version of reality TV email, which provides glimpses into their lives and personalities. The best part is that you, just like CrazyIslander, get to decide how far you want to take them.
Image credits: Krsto Jevtic (not the actual photo)
As his story went viral, the original poster (OP) joined the discussion in the comments
People eagerly reacted to his petty revenge and shared tips on how it could be made even better
Some even responded with their own similar experiences
Poll Question
Thanks! Check out the results:
Subscribe to Access
Exclusive Polls
By entering your email and clicking Subscribe, you're agreeing to let us send you customized marketing messages about us and our advertising partners. You are also agreeing to our Privacy Policy.
Thank you! You've successfully subscribed to newsletters!
You May Also Like
Woman Refuses To Chip In For Babysitting Because She Doesn’t Even Have Kids, Asks If She’s A Jerk
Do you think childless individuals should be expected to chip in for group babysitting costs during friend gatherings?
17 Y.O. Is Done Sharing Her Birthday With Her Late Twin, Parents Are Not Having It
Do you think the girl should be allowed to celebrate her birthday without the remembrance of her deceased twin?
I first saw this years ago and I dont beleve it. perhaps in the 90's this was true. These days you cant really do it this way - you are required to confirm email addresses by clicking a link sent to you, so you would never finish your signup to a forum.
Unfortunately the spammy emails never require a verification, and many sites do let you use them without actually verifying your email address. I have an address that regularly gets emails for someone else (I assume he has a very similar address) and once got a series of Chuck E. Cheese party planning confirmations for someone in a different state on my main firstnamelastname account despite having an unusual name.
Load More Replies...
We did the same thing, in à non-tech way, to the former owners of our house. Not only had they left quite à few "surprises" for us to find ( the guy was a DIY fan but really s*cked at it!), but they neglected for à while to change their address and redirect their mail, so we had to forward them everything. So we signed them up for all kinds of things... at their new address, from funeral home informations to diaper samples to the Jehovah Witnesses. Was fun!
Oh My Goodness! Completely ot from op post but you mentioning surprises left behind reminded me of when my parents bought the house they are in now. They had to deal with similar “surprises” in their home when they moved in. One night, someone tried to enter the house but was stopped by the hotel style lock engaged on the door. Next morning my parents found a surprise that explained who and why. Above the refrigerator they found hundreds of dollars worth of brand new bottles of fancy liquors and expensive scotch, gin, you name it. Literally crammed full. My parents immediately changed all locks (they’d been here less than a month and had been busy making repairs to the other surprises so hadn’t had much time to do before). They enjoyed drinking every last bit of that final surprise for many months after.
Load More Replies...
Some yank gym sent me spam CONSTANTLY ("here's the appointment you booked!"). I live in a different continent, not the Feces States of Murrica. WHY would I "book" a gym 10,000km away? I collected EVERY email address I could and forwarded their spam back ten times for every one they sent. (It was a 10-20 store gym, not some international company, so their owner's email was easy to find.) I pasted in every email, "I hope the news says the next Elliot Rodger or George Sodini visits your gym." They whined "that's not an appropriate thing to say!" Wrong. Sending unwanted and unsolicited spam is what's inappropriate. Only once it affected them personally, when I was using throwaway emails to repeatedly send their spam back at them did they finally stop. Apparently living halfway around the world wasn't enough reason for them to stop spamming me.
I first saw this years ago and I dont beleve it. perhaps in the 90's this was true. These days you cant really do it this way - you are required to confirm email addresses by clicking a link sent to you, so you would never finish your signup to a forum.
Unfortunately the spammy emails never require a verification, and many sites do let you use them without actually verifying your email address. I have an address that regularly gets emails for someone else (I assume he has a very similar address) and once got a series of Chuck E. Cheese party planning confirmations for someone in a different state on my main firstnamelastname account despite having an unusual name.
Load More Replies... We did the same thing, in à non-tech way, to the former owners of our house. Not only had they left quite à few "surprises" for us to find ( the guy was a DIY fan but really s*cked at it!), but they neglected for à while to change their address and redirect their mail, so we had to forward them everything. So we signed them up for all kinds of things... at their new address, from funeral home informations to diaper samples to the Jehovah Witnesses. Was fun!
Oh My Goodness! Completely ot from op post but you mentioning surprises left behind reminded me of when my parents bought the house they are in now. They had to deal with similar “surprises” in their home when they moved in. One night, someone tried to enter the house but was stopped by the hotel style lock engaged on the door. Next morning my parents found a surprise that explained who and why. Above the refrigerator they found hundreds of dollars worth of brand new bottles of fancy liquors and expensive scotch, gin, you name it. Literally crammed full. My parents immediately changed all locks (they’d been here less than a month and had been busy making repairs to the other surprises so hadn’t had much time to do before). They enjoyed drinking every last bit of that final surprise for many months after.
Load More Replies... Some yank gym sent me spam CONSTANTLY ("here's the appointment you booked!"). I live in a different continent, not the Feces States of Murrica. WHY would I "book" a gym 10,000km away? I collected EVERY email address I could and forwarded their spam back ten times for every one they sent. (It was a 10-20 store gym, not some international company, so their owner's email was easy to find.) I pasted in every email, "I hope the news says the next Elliot Rodger or George Sodini visits your gym." They whined "that's not an appropriate thing to say!" Wrong. Sending unwanted and unsolicited spam is what's inappropriate. Only once it affected them personally, when I was using throwaway emails to repeatedly send their spam back at them did they finally stop. Apparently living halfway around the world wasn't enough reason for them to stop spamming me.
69
22