Ask Spamooze
Why do I get emails that are spam, but just gibberish??
One of the primary methods of filtering spam is a heuristic check to try and determine if the email is indeed spam or not. This has caused 2 forms of the "gibberish" spam to occur.
The first is an actual spam message trying to sell you something that has random character replacements or additions in the body and subject of the email. The hope of the spammers is by doing this they will muddle the message enough so the spam filter gets confused and allows the message through, but not so muddled such that you cannot read the message.
The other is an email message that is just pure gibberish. The spammers might send this message for a couple reasons. First, messages like this can actually throw off the filter for future scans. Many spam filters learn as they go, as new spam messages are generated and sent out into the world. By sending pure gibberish, which is often let through, chances of the first type of "gibberish" spam being allowed through is increased. The other reason for these pure gibberish emails is that they can be used to verify that your email address is valid. As email is received by the server, it is usually first checked to see if that email address is valid. If it is not, the message is bounced back to the sender and they know that the email is not valid. However, if the message makes it through the first stage and is not bounced back, the spammer knows that your email address is valid, regardless whether the spam filter catches it or not.
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