How to Avoid Harassing Emails

Receiving harassing emails can be very annoying and alarming. As with any form of harassment, your privacy is violated and you want it to stop. Unfortunately, you can't use technology to prevent someone from contacting you via email if they know your electronic mailing address. Although this doesn't mean that there are no solutions to your problem, what it does mean is that there really isn't anything you can do to actually stop the person from sending you messages unless you delete your account and create a new one.

That said, going through the hassle of deleting your email-account really shouldn't be your first choice, especially when there are other alternatives out there that do work. After all, just because you obtain a new webmail address doesn't mean that account will also not be harassed.

Here are the options you can implement to avoid harassing digital messages:

- Delete it - You never have to look at any communication you receive if you don't want to. Send it directly to the trash and don't think about it again. They can send you all of the messages they want but there is no law that says you have to read them.

- Mark it as spam - If constant deleting frustrates you and you don't even want to see this mail appear in your inbox, no problem, mark the e-mail as junk and from now on it will be sent to your junk/bulk folder.

- Use the black list or block list feature - Many web mailing providers enable you to block all communications that are sent from a certain electronic-mail address. All letters sent by those who are added to this list will be automatically deleted and you will never receive them. Find out what type of features your online mail host offers.

- Complain to the person's ISP (Internet Service Provider) - If you just can't get a break from the harasser and have reached the end of your rope, you can notify the sender's ISP of the harassment. Most ISPs consider such behavior a violation of their terms of service and may choose to look into and can cancel the individual's account. However, making a complaint, though worth the try, isn't always successful because many service providers are simply far to busy to deal with the issue.

Finally, if the harassments are frightening because they are threatening you or someone else you love physical harm, you should save the messages and inform legal authorities of the situation to be on the safe side. In addition, use an email search to try and uncover the identity of the sender by looking up their e mail address.