Readers tell me it's getting so bad that they get as much spam as they do legit e-mail. There are dozens of tools to reduce spam, but there's one I've used that has captured and disintegrated almost 95 percent of the spam aimed at me.

If you're new to my newsletter, you might first jump back to last week's newsletter to get a sense of other spam problems and solutions.

MailWasher: Spam's Stalwart Enemy

I've tried dozens of third-party programs to block spam and for one reason (it's too brain intensive for my limited cerebral resources) or another (it's no better than e-mail filtering), I haven't stuck with any of them.

But I think the hunt is over.

MailWasher has all the characteristics that I like in a spam blocker. It works like a charm--it's truly easy to set up and use, and it nails spam at the door by filtering, bouncing, blacklisting, and removing it. And if you want to be a cheapskate, it's absolutely free.

Dig this: Deploy all ships. Man all battle stations. It's Battleships: General Quarters, a cool game once you get the knack.

How MailWasher Works

MailWasher works on your incoming missives before you open your e-mail program. The program goes to the mail server, just as your e-mail program does, but retrieves only the header information and the first few lines of each message. From there, I take action: I mark messages I recognize as spam, or agree with MailWasher's suspicion that they're spam. One click and MailWasher spits the message back to the sender, camouflaging it with "address not found." Yep, it really looks like it's bounced mail.

After a few days use, you'll find it a no-brainer to add e-mail buddies to a friends list and the junk that MailWasher's not sure of to a spam list. After you've used MailWasher for a while, it collects enough info--through heuristic checking and filtering--that most spam is automatically blocked without any intervention.

Besides stopping spam, there's a side benefit: MailWasher prevents e-mail with viruses attached from infecting your computer. That's because attachments are actually part of the message, so when MailWasher deletes the message, the attachment is deleted too.

Take a Video Break

Stan Miastkowski gets all the good assignments. In his last one, he was asked to spend a week playing around with emulating a TiVo with his computer. Read how he was able to do it in "Step by Step: Turn Your PC Into a Personal Video Recorder."

My MailWasher Strategy

There are a few ways to use MailWasher, depending on how you approach getting e-mail. I have MailWasher run first thing in the morning, the time when I receive the biggest chunk of e-mail. (I have the program loaded into my Startup group.) Out of the 75 or so messages I get, MailWasher automatically sends about 20 back into the Ethernet. I look over and mark the rest, bouncing, blacklisting, and deleting some, and then have MailWasher process the rest.

I'm using a DSL connection, so it's no big deal to set MailWasher to wash my e-mail every minute, and have Eudora Pro check every two minutes. That way MailWasher filters out the spam just before Eudora checks for messages.

OTOH, if you check mail occasionally--say, every hour--you can load MailWasher, let it do its work, and then open your e-mail program to read and respond to your messages.

Get Your Copy Here

MailWasher works with any e-mail client except Web-based programs such as Hotmail, Yahoo and AOL. The author's promised an upgrade to handle that soon. The disadvantage? Because it's a stand-alone program, you need to run it before using your regular e-mail client. Grab a copy of MailWasher at the PC.World.com Downloads site.

BTW, you need to be aware that the author, Nick Bolton, gets paid by donations. Once you use MailWasher--and see its value for yourself--send the guy $10 or $20 bucks. It'll feel good and will encourage him to improve the program.

Dig this: Who, you ask, is Maarten Rutgers and what's the fuss over his Web site? Start with a few of my favorite pages and you'll see why I find his work intriguing: Click Science and choose Vortex Street. Or click Fun, and check out the Giant Bubble.

Next week? My final column on spam and the brand new program you must have if you use Outlook or Outlook Express. Plus something for MSN fans.

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