Spam Floods Inboxes of Gmail Users

Users of Gmail a free web-mail utility of Google have been frantically posting messages on Twitter about spam flooding their inboxes.

The issue, as per several posts on the Gmail help forum of Google, started since the fourth week of April and continued till May end 2009. A number of threads produced posts that Google's spam filter wasn't working effectively.

However, over a month now since the problem started, an increasing number of Gmail users are complaining via Twitter on the forums of Google that the levels of spam in their mailboxes have increased drastically.

On June 1, 2009, Search Engine Roundtable forum displayed a post that said that something bad had seemed to shoot up during the day as was evident from the number of posts that appeared during the weekend.

Moreover, HobbyFarming a Gmail user reported that a huge volume of spam mails were piercing spam filters to reach the inbox of the user. MXLogic published this on June 1, 2009.

On April 21, 2009, HobbyFarming had written that spam was infiltrating the inbox in several hundred numbers daily that wasn't an exaggeration. Thus HobbyFarming was preparing to return to Yahoo Mail to avoid the frustration, in light of the new problem as the situation was never so unfavorable until what was happening since the recent weeks, the user had written.

In response Sarah, an employee of Google posted on April 22, 2009 that Google knew about the hazard. Further, the e-mail provider was investigating the issue, Sarah said that MXLogic reported.

Now after over 31 days Google says merely a tiny percentage of users of its Gmail were hit with a faulty spam filter configuration that resulted in the spam flood for the users.

Stated Jason Freidenfelds, spokesman for Google, that because of an incorrect configuration in a few of Google's servers, the company wasn't filtering spam, thus affecting some 1% of Gmail members. But the problem was now fixed and the company was apologizing for any inconvenience caused, Freidenfelds added. USAToday published this on June 1, 2009.

Nevertheless, Freidenfelds refused to give the exact number of affected users.

Related article: Spam Scam Bags a Scottish Connection

» SPAMfighter News - 6/6/2009