Below are seven trends I've noticed. These are things you should NEVER do in business unless you want to ruin your reputation and throw your business away.

1. SPAM. This one should be obvious. When you send email to someone who doesn't ask for it, you're asking for trouble.

Let me make this abundantly clear: I AM A WOMAN. Therefore, I don't need Viagra, I don't have a package, and I'm not interested in pleasing women. I don't want a mortgage because it's too much yard work, and what I do behind closed doors whether I own it or not is none of your business.

To solve this problem, I recommend you encrypt your email address on your site. There are plenty of free email encryptors on web you can use. I only have one account that really gets a lot of spam, and that's because I use it to receive newsletters, post on forums and to get public email.

Here's email encryptor I use, and it works very well: http://automaticlabs.com/products/enkoderform/

I also use SPAM Assassin as part of my webhosting, and it shoots down a lot without causing me to lose email I am looking for.

2. Frivolous SPAM Complaints. I had a spam complaint filed against me because a link to my site in my resource box for one of my articles had word marketing in it. The article wasn't even published in my newsletter.

I filed a rebuttal and dropped it. It was obvious to me that person who filed complaint didn't know how to read. Newsletter publishers don't normally spam. They send their email to subscribers. What's worse is so called regulatory group let complaint be filed without even bothering to read email.

The best thing to do here is to make your newsletter list double opt in. My web hosting company requires this, but they have it set up automatically for me, so it's not a problem.

The rest you can ignore. Ignorance is supposed bliss. These people don't have any problems to solve so they won't need your products.

You can also make a link available at bottom of your email so that readers can unsubscribe. Occassionally, you will still get mail from newbies who don't know how to click link. When you do, just click it yourself.

For those of you who like to file these types of complaints, try to be a little more careful when you read your email. For those of us on here trying to make an honest buck, we aren't out to get you.

This is third of a five-part series on Maximizing E-mail Security ROI.

E-mail is an easy, cheap and readily available form of communication. It’s a great tool for businesses, but without proper safeguards in place to regulate information transmitted it can also be a potential threat. An effective e-mail policy should be all-encompassing, helping organizations comply with federal regulations, protect intellectual property and prevent offensive materials from being transmitted across their networks.

Companies in healthcare and financial industries are compelled by law to ensure that they meet strict requirements with regards to patient and customer information privacy. In addition, virtually all publicly traded companies must now implement measures to prevent leaks of confidential corporate information. A large part of complying with these regulations involves implementation and enforcement of corporate e-mail policy.

According to The ePolicy Institute’s “2003 E-Mail Rules, Policies and Practices” study, only about half (52%) of 1100 U.S. companies surveyed have any form of e-mail monitoring and policy enforcement. Even more alarmingly, only 19% monitor internal e-mail and only 39% monitor outgoing e-mail, leaving a large majority of American businesses wide open to a litany of harsh consequences. These consequences include financial penalties due to violations of federal legislation, loss of competitive advantage from breaches of confidentiality, lawsuits from employees alleging a hostile work environment and destruction of company reputation as a result of disgruntled employees or irresponsible e-mail use.

This week’s newsletter will focus on issues surrounding e-mail policy enforcement and what companies can do to ensure that they are not harmed by regulatory violations, intellectual property loss, costly litigation and embarrassing headlines.

Regulatory Compliance

In nearly every industry, e-mail is primary method of communication, both internally and outside organization. Healthcare professionals use it to collaborate with colleagues and staff and correspond with patients. Banks, brokerage firms, insurance companies and tax preparation firms use it to communicate with customers and partners and perform countless millions of online transactions every day. Company employees and executives use e-mail to relay messages discussing corporate financial performance, proprietary product information and human resource records.

The ever-increasing reliance on e-mail is has brought with it federal legislation such as Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA), Gramm-Leach Bliley Act of 1999 (GLBA) and Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (SoX), mandating protection of confidential information that is stored on, or accessible through, enterprise networks. Generally speaking, this legislation is designed to compel businesses to:

• Ensure that e-mail messages containing confidential information are kept secure when transmitted over an unprotected link;
• Ensure that e-mail systems and users are properly authenticated so that confidential information does not get into wrong hands;
• Protect e-mail servers and message stores where confidential information may be stored; and
• Identify and track information that must remain confidential.

Asset and Intellectual Property Protection

Among a company’s most important assets are its proprietary product- or service-related data and other information designed to attain competitive advantage. However, e-mail’s prevalence and ease of use make it a ticking time bomb for companies wishing to protect this information. A study published by PC Week revealed that upwards of 30% of 800 employees surveyed admitted that they had sent confidential information such as financial reports, customer records or product data via e-mail to recipients outside company. Ten percent admitted receiving e-mail containing confidential information.