McAfee Issues Quiz to Spot Sites That Spam

McAfee has issued an online quiz along with a challenge to Web users: “Can you spot sites that cause spam?” The 8-question quiz presents consumers with pairs of Web sites and asks them to judge which of the two sites is likely to guard their e-mail address. The examples in the quiz are taken from more than 6.4 million Web sites which McAfee SiteAdvisor has independently tested and rated for Web safety issues including spyware, viruses, exploits, online scams, and of course, spam. The pairs of sites used in the quiz come from common categories including free games, e-cards, online sweepstakes, credit cards, scholarships, online dating, jokes and petitions. Registering on the eight sites flagged as unsafe resulted in 2,697 e-mails per week in McAfee SiteAdvisor’s test inboxes.Signing up at the worst e-mailer offender in the quiz resulted in 1,075 e-mails per week. The vast majority of e-mails received contained highly commercial content from third parties. “This quiz was designed to deliver two very important messages. The first is that spam remains a significant problem. A single bad decision can render an e-mail address all but unusable,” said Chris Dixon, Director of Product Strategy. “The second is that on the Web today, there is almost always a safe alternative for popular activities. The extra information provided by McAfee SiteAdvisor’s test results can help users make smarter click decisions.” The quiz is available at http://www.mcafee.com/spamquiz.