5 Tools to Bounce Spam Email Back to Sender with Non-Delivery
If you’ve ever posted your email address publicly in online forums or in the comment area of a blog, it is very likely to get harvested by spammers to send unsolicited emails to you. Another common way for spammers to easily and quickly create a database of email addresses is by using software to automatically generate millions of email addresses from a dictionary file and so coincidentally your username is found in their dictionary. This is why a newly registered and unused email address can still receive spam.
The currently most used method to fight spam is to block it using an anti spam system which is either pre-installed in your email server, installing as a plugin to your email client software or a standalone program on your computer. Another way to fight spammers is to bounce a non-delivery notification back to the sender which they might take you off their email address list. Here we have 5 tools which you can use to bounce email back to sender.
1. Block SenderBlock Sender is an extension for Gmail available for Chrome and Firefox web browsers. Basically this extension allows you to easily move emails to the trash based on sender, domain, subject or a word/phrase by clicking on a “Block” button next to Delete in conversation using Gmail’s filtering system.
An additional feature found in Block Sender is the ability to automatically reply with a fake bounce informing the sender that the mailbox is unavailable. The bounce feature is disabled by default and can be turned on from Options by ticking the checkbox for “Send a fake bounced message after blocking”.
Do note that the experimental “Canned Responses” feature in Gmail Labs must be enabled for the sending of fake bounced messages to work. Block Sender has a free plan for individuals to “block a few messages”. Through testing we found that the free plan is more like a trial plan with only up to 5 blocks and after that you are asked to upgrade to their monthly/yearly paid premium unlimited blocking plan. There are ways to add more free blocks by adding a review, sharing on Facebook or posting a tweet.
2. Spam Bully
Spam Bully is an anti spam software that works with Microsoft Outlook, Windows Live Mail, Outlook Express, Windows Mail and also has a standalone IMAP version if you do not use any of the mentioned email client software. Other than having the ability to identify which emails are good and spam using the Bayesian spam filter system, it comes with an optional feature to fight back by sending bounce messages and to punish sender by silently visiting any links found on the email body without doing anything else.
You’ll need to press and hold the Control button while clicking on the Fight Back button from the menubar to bring up the options window as shown in the above screenshot or else the default option will be used to fight back. SpamBully is a shareware that cost $29.95 for a 1 year subscription.
3. Bounce Bully
Bounce Bully is created by the same company as Spam Bully except it is free and comes only with the “Fight back” features. It is quite troublesome to use Bounce Bully because you’ll need manually to copy and paste the full email including the headers into the message box, then only click on the Bounce or Punish button. The bounce message and the number of times to punish can be changed from the Config tab.
One important note on sending bounced messages using Spam Bully and Bounce Bully is they are sent using an internal SMTP engine which is why you won’t find an option to configure and use a 3rd party SMTP server. If your Internet Service Provider blocks port 25, then bouncing messages to the sender will not work.
4. MailWasher
MailWasher is a very popular standalone spam blocking tool that has been around for more than 10 years and is still in active development. It is free and most importantly very effective in detecting spam using multiple methods such as whitelist/blacklist, filters, external spam database checking, and Bayesian statistical technique. You can also take revenge on spammers by bouncing it back to them.
To bounce a detected spam email, simply right click on it and select “Mark for bounce” or alternatively click on the bounce icon as shown at the screenshot above. When you’ve finished reviewing the emails, click on the “Wash Mail” button to remove the spam from your email server and send fake bounced emails to the ones that marked for bounce. Works on popular webmail such as Gmail, Outlook.com, Yahoo and etc.
5. IncrediMail
IncrediMail is an email client software that is well known for its flashy animations which looked great when it was new but definitely a bit outdated today especially when it is ran on Windows 8.1. It used to be shareware, turned into freeware and is now bundled with a ton of adware and even an experienced computer user would have to be extra careful during installation or else they’d end up with adware that is difficult to remove.
Bouncing back to sender is really easy with IncrediMail because this feature is integrated into the software. Just right click on the email, go to “Block / Bounce” and select “Bounce to Sender”. Confirm the action and a fake non-delivery email will be automatically created and placed in outbox queued for sending.
Final Notes: Bouncing spam may or may not get your email address off of a spammer’s list. Depending on the sender, some of them don’t care about the validity of the email addresses in their list and all they want to do is just send out mass emails blindly. There are some that ignore the bounce because they rely on an email address checker that is able to verify whether your email address exists.
You might also like:
7 SMTP Providers to Hide Sender IP Address in Email Headers
Gmail Keeps Marking Email as Spam: How to Stop it for Good
5 Ways to Clean Up Spam or Mailbomb Messages from Email Inbox
15 Free Temporary Email Address Sites [One Day, Week, Month]
3 Tools to Recover Deleted Email Messages from a Corrupted Database in The Bat!
That last comment should be 1000 blocked.
I have used Mailwasher to bounce them back to the sender. The sender got irritated with me and now sends 50-100 daily. They all land in my spam folder, but a few sneak through. I just send them to the spam folder. One click and all of them are deleted. I do this several times a day. The fake emails addresses are too long for Yahoo + to block. I already have 000 blocked. Maximum.
Beware if you use Thunderbird. I paid for the Mailwasher Pro, only to find out (after emails from their tech people) that it doesn’t work on new versions. I was told to reinstall an old version of Thunderbird. I did and Thunderbird automatically updated again. I lost all my saved addresses from 10 years of business. Not happy, I asked for a refund but got no reply!
beware if you use mailwasher. I paid for a lifetime membership and it seems according to them a lifetime membership is only good for about 3 to 6 years and then they refuse to honor ir
Yeah… well done. You’re indirectly flooding the spammer’s ISP with spams…
I hardly think a few million emails being returned to spammers is going to bring ISPs around the world to their knees. Surely those causing the much bigger problem is those sending out spam emails by their hundreds of millions in the first place?
why dont people just do what i do with spammers
use ‘who is’
the get all the ip info and domain email info from the spammer
then simply sign them up to every porn site and also the many many email mail lists
and also to their own spam email engine
Good idea, but how do you get the real email address behind the spoofed one?
Most spammers are using spoofed return addresses, spoofed from addresses, and spoofed headers. I’m an amateur and I can send an email from a private mail server and make it look like it’s coming from the US White House. You’d need access to the senders ISP tools to know otherwise. Hell, there are free tools that let you do this. It’s no different than when a spammer / scammer calls you and it shows a different phone number.
However, they would only like that
Hi Raymond,
I have an iMac and i wondered if there is an Apple App that does the same sort of thing as Mailwasher? I want to block a sender and have their email bounce back to them from a yahoo account using apple products.
Many thanks!
Hi Sue,
Airmail can do that.
help.airmailapp.com/en-us/article/bounce-airmail-for-macos-159fyx5/
Mailwashers bounce back doesnt work. I tested it on my own email by sending an email from another of my accounts to my email on my Mailwasher account and I never got the bounced email stating that the address I was sending it to didnt exist.
pam,
So, despite the sender account not receiving notice that the “To” address didn’t exist, did the unwanted email still get through even as Spam?
I need something for my Yahoo account and blocking email addresses doesn’t work. I have many times input a spammer’s email address in the block field only for it to tell me I’ve already blocked that address.
And I’m not willing to pay unless a tool is proven effective.
Re: Gmails BLOCK SENDER : “the free plan is more like a trial plan with only up to 5 blocks and after that you are asked to upgrade to their monthly/yearly paid premium unlimited blocking plan”.
And there you have it in a nutshell! Its all about the dosh. Gmail should have this enabled for free at the very front door of opening an account. This is akin to buying a new car with brakes that will only work 5 times then your stuffed. Your not told this at first, but once youve been through the windscreen, you then find out you have to subscibe to having proper brakes fitted.
Block Sender is a third party app, not produced by Google or Gmail. So obviously Gmail could not have enabled this app for free. They could of course make their own version of the extension or incorporate the features into Gmail itself, and then if they tried to charge for it, your comment “Its [sic] all about the dosh” would be relevant. But keep in mind that Gmail is free — so you are getting what you pay for.
What I want is a way inform sender of rejection of all emails having “do not reply” addresses. They require all my info (except sex of my canine) for any communication I initiate, then give me minimal info of them. Revenge thru informing them of “do not reply” email rejection many times is interesting to me.
Oh, we have only MXLinux here. No windows to clean or re-clean.
Thank you for the guidance..
So what works to bounce spam in gmail in 2018?
Why is Mailwasher not bouncing back the emails? I use hotmail, I tryend changing the SMTP from port 25 to the one of my hotmail SMTP but it still doesn’t work.
Incredimail bounce feature NO LONGER WORKS. You should update this site.
Are there legal ways to create a hit on the bottom line of these opportunistic bottom feeders? Perhaps a v ariation on the Consumer Protection Agency: Hell’s Angels Bounty on Names, & Address’s of SPAMMERS. The Senate is forcing a vote on net nutrality to repeal the repeal.
WHEN THE GOING GETS TOUGH, THE WIERD TURN PRO…
There are new GDPR regulations due to be in place from 26 May 2018. this will give people a lot more rights over their data. It will need you to reply to request they remove your data and that you are using your ‘right to be forgotten’ – but if they don’t delete your data from their systems you can then contact the Information Commissioner. With the new regulations don’t be surprised if you see some big companies getting it wrong and some large fines being dished out early days.
Are there any free email bounce programs that actually work on Linux?
Incredimail bounce is fake that’s what they confirm. theirselves. It cost you about 30 Euro !
What works is block sender for Gmail !
Thanks for taking the time to share this valuable information. I just want revenge, REVENGE I TELL YOU, on those pesky little spammers. That is what led me to you…I typed revenge on scammers. That’s how they’ve got me (shakes head and sighs). I particularly loved the list in ‘spam tools , then under ‘profanity list’. That is quite some selection :-) he he he just noticed these responses were written 8 years ago. Gawd I’m lagging.
Just a note…… Mailwasher will NOT work with yahoo mail…… yahoo mail does not allow bouncing of emails even if using a program such as mailwasher. I have tried both Mailwasher, and BounceBully and neither of them will work with a yahoo mail email account, even if you use outlook with it.
I really wish it did,
You should get a gmail account. Yahoo is garbage.
nice post. thanks. but what about mac? any software for bouncing mails? thanks.
Mailwasher works great! it not only bounces with the standard “no person exists” to the “sender” but it sends a notification to the sending server, the REAL sending server, not the one in the “from” address. We used it at my former employer , we used to recieve 40-70 spams a day. After about 2-3 weeks it got whittled down to 5-10 spams a day. After a couple months we were consistantly getting only 1-2 average a day.
Thanks for the tip. This might be useful to finally get rid of all those spams from Ticketmaster. If anyone has not yet bought tickets from them, my advice is to use a throw-away email address because they put you on a list without asking and they do not honor unsubscribe requests.
Thanks Ray. Actually, I need this program for my bitchy Ex who keeps sending my messages. Now, I’ll start bouncing back all her emails LOL
Nice share ty Raymond
great article! i was looking for this. thx
Thank you Raymond, really i try your blog recently, it’s very nice!
This article is very usefull, i need really that. :D
i have something very evil in mind. thanxz ray.
nice find ray,
thanks
Really Excellent Tip.Need 2 check it out personally, til then a Great THANKS!
Thank you, Raymond for informing your readers about spamming.
hello raymond!
this is usefull!
Thanks Raymond for the info. This is a very precious info for Computer users as 95% of all Emails is Spam. So, to fight Spam, we need to be aware of the tricks used by Spammers. Thanks again!!!
great
THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS
very infromative as usual …
Like Richrd say ,you have a very nice site and I appreciate your hard work!
Thx for the Thread!