Spam - Security and Privacy

Important Notice: ICQ staff will never ask you for your password, or ask you by email to send information to ICQ or to forward messages to others. If we have any announcement to our users, they will be posted on the ICQ Web site.

Spam is unsolicited, usually commercial or objectionable, form of communication (e.g. using e-mail, instant messaging, etc.) sent to a large number of recipients. The privacy tools integrated into ICQ offer 5 approaches to help you identify and minimize your spam exposure:

	Filter Incoming Messages Filter or ignore the content of incoming messages and events.
		Stop a Spammer Choose not to receive messages and other events from a specific ICQ number or from an ICQ number not on your Contact List.
		Ignore Mass Messaging Choose not to receive events sent to multiple recipients.
	Ignore Incoming URLs Choose not to receive Web Page URL notifications
	ICQmail Privacy Filters! 2 sets of filters on ICQmail working towards ensuring your e-mail privacy.

ICQ is an avid supporter of free speech and communication between people and has created the ICQ network with this vision. While caring for freedom of speech, ICQ is also very dedicated to user privacy, and so keeps developing and offering its users privacy tools and features that each user can set in order to sustain the privacy level they seek. In doing so ICQ allows each user to define what they conceive as spam, a definition that may vary from one user to another.

ICQ continues its effort to minimize spam. In dealing with its users, ICQ employs strict policies relating to abuse of the ICQ network by any ICQ user. These policies are changed from time to time to meet the ever-changing needs of the growing ICQ community. They are not disclosed in order to avoid their abuse.

Following are some of the privacy tools integrated into ICQ for your use:

Filter Incoming Messages:

Words Filter
This unique filter tool enables you to keep a list of chosen words you prefer not to receive in your incoming messages. You can choose whether you would like to completely ignore messages containing these words, or to just delete them from the message body.
To activate this service, click

-> Security & Privacy Permissions -> Words List

Stop a Spammer:

Ignore List
ICQ enables you to control from which users you wish to receive events and which you prefer to ignore. If you receive unwanted Spam messages from a specific user, adding his/her ICQ# to your Ignore List will cause events from that user not to be shown to you without the sender being aware of it.
To activate this service, click

-> Security & Privacy Permissions -> Ignore List
Tip: Drag a user name from your Contact List directly into your Ignore List for the quickest way to ignore a spammer.

Note: This option does not apply to EmailExpress, and does not fully apply to ICQ SMS messages.

More Options in the Security and Privacy Permissions dialog box:

Messages: You can choose from whom you will accept ICQ Multi-recipient, WWpager, and Email Express messages. To activate these services, click

-> Security & Privacy Permissions -> Spam Control.

Accept Messages Only From People On My Contact List
Checking this option will make ICQ ignore messages and events from users who are not on your Contact List.

Do not accept EmailExpress
You may choose not to accept EmailExpress messages. If you choose this option, incoming EmailExpress messages will not be shown to you.
To activate this service, click

-> Security & Privacy Permissions -> Spam Control.

Ignore Mass Messaging:

Do Not Accept Multiple Recipient Messages From All Users or Users Not on my Contact List
Multiple Recipient messages are messages sent by a user to a number of users simultaneously.
ICQ enables you to ignore Multiple Recipient messages from all users or only from those not on your Contact List.
Note: This option does not apply to EmailExpress messages.
To activate this service, click

-> Security & Privacy Permissions -> Spam Control.

Ignore Incoming URLs:

Do not receive Web Page Address (URL) notifications
ICQ enables you to ignore URLs from all users. To activate this service, click

-> Security & Privacy Permissions -> Communications -> Web Page Address (URL). Select No one.

ICQmail Privacy Filters:

There are 2 sets of filters on ICQmail that help ensure the privacy of your email account:

Server level filters
These help eliminate spam, based on distinctive information gathered from previous spam messages. These filters are updated daily to provide an active and dynamic anti-spam defence. This does not eliminate e-mail spam completely, but it can help filter unwanted mail based on mail headers only (NOT on the content of your e-mail messages).

Filters set by the user
These are filters determined and set by you, the ICQmail user. By setting these filters, unwanted mail will be deleted before it hits your mailbox, based on specific words in the message header or body. To learn how to set and edit your ICQmail filters, read the ICQmail help files at http://www.icqmail.com/

Anti Spam Efforts:

We continuously work to reduce the exposure of ICQ users to spamming on the ICQ network. However, it is also in your hands to set your ICQ privacy features to this end. Next time you receive or read such messages, you may want to consider resetting your privacy tools to avoid receipt of these kinds of events in the future.

You may also be interested to know that, as part of the AOL family, ICQ actively supports AOL's larger efforts towards eliminating spam on the web. For more information on these efforts, go to http://legal.web.aol.com/resources/legislation/email.html.

Note: ICQ Inc. does not guarantee that the features described in this Web site, including the privacy features specified in this page, will operate according to the description provided herein or operate at all. Also, please note that this page relates to the ICQ 99a version software only. The various ICQ software versions may contain different privacy features.

The ICQ Anti Spam Button
If you support ICQ in its fight against spam, put the ICQ Anti Spam button on your site.
Select an applet below, copy the code and paste it in your Web site HTML source:

	<applet code="banner.class" codebase="http://public.icq.com/applets/partner/" width=183 height=31> <param name="num" value="1"> <param name="prefix" value="spam"> </applet>

	<applet code="banner.class" codebase="http://public.icq.com/applets/partner/" width=183 height=31> <param name="num" value="1"> <param name="prefix" value="spam2"> </applet>