Sherry | 
02 12th, 2009| 
Dear Colleague/Friend/Family/Mom,
I love hearing from you and knowing you’re thinking of me. I’m flattered that you know my taste so well: I enjoy the strategic advice you’re forwarding about shopping mall parking lot safety and the pithy anecdotes about dogs getting into Heaven. However, regarding what are commonly referred to as chain e-mails? Please exclude me from your list of recipients. I rarely open them and I never pass them along to others.
This type of e-mail poses a threat to the security of my computer. One of the worst things a computer user can do is share her e-mail address with too many people, which gets it added into any number of address books.
Whenever an e-mail is forwarded to others, all the e-mail addresses that came before are also forwarded. Did you know that all of those people you sent the chain letter to now have my e-mail address? I would never share your e-mail address with anyone without your permission, and I hope that from now on you will return the favor.
Also, you’d be surprised at how many computers have some sort of malware residing on them. Many users don’t even know there is malware on their computer. Some of the sneakier malware harvests e-mail addresses from your address book and e-mail.
If you do want to send an e-mail to more than a few people, you can help protect those email addresses by using the BCC (blind carbon copy) field instead of the “To” or “CC” fields. This will hide multiple addresses from prying eyes.
And, by all means, please first check the validity of the story on a trusted web site such as: www.snopes.com.
Thanks for listening. I hope we can still be friends.