AUTOMATED UNSUBSCRIBE TIP

Do you get subscribed to stuff accidentally or unknowingly and don’t want to keep unsubscribing to everything? Here is a tip on how to automatically send notice to everyone to keep you off their lists.

The trick is simple: Use your email vacation responder feature to set send out an “unsubscribe” message to everyone who sends you email. Include in the message a friendly apology to personal correspondents and they will certainly understand your goal.

GMAIL USERS

1. From a computer in a web browser — you cannot do this on a phone or tablet app — go to gmail.com and login to your email account. If you do not remember your password, do not keep trying to guess it because you will be locked out. After two or at most three tries, click Forgot Password and reset it. _{While you there in Google account settings, also be sure to update your phone number and security email addresses too. It is a good policy to have at 1 alternate email address and at most 2. (If you cannot remember the password of your primary email, how will you remember the password to 3 or more other email accounts!!! Stick to one and only one alternate email account, or use the account of a trusted friend.)}
2. If you get locked out, contact B. A. Computer Services and we may be able to assist you for a fee.
3. Click the Settings icon in the upper right, then click See All Settings.
4. Scroll all the way down to Vacation Responder.
5. Turn Vacation Responder ON
6. Select Plain Text
7. Enter: unsubscribe {youremailaddress}
8. Optionally, add a blank line or two, and enter a message for human people like, “If you are a personal correspondent, please disregard this message. I have received your email and will respond as soon as practical. Thank you.”
9. Do not click, Only send message to people in my contacts list. That is exactly the opposite of what you want.
10. BE CERTAIN to click the SAVE CHANGES button. If you forget to do that, nothing you changed will take affect.

The UNSUBSCRIBE instruction will automatically unsubscribe you from some, not all, list-services. Some services may not understand the instruction. To unsubscribe from them, you must follow the instructions they are required to give by law at the end of the email message. If they do not have instructions or a link to unsubscribe there, here is another trick to eliminate them automatically.

Create Rule to Send Spam to Trash Automatically

1. Under gmail settings, See All Settings, select Filters and Blocked Addresses
2. Click Create a New Filter
3. You will want to be careful here because if you are too general with keywords, messages from personal correspondents may get filtered out too. There is a better way to automatically create filters.

A Better Way

1. Go to you Inbox. Click on a message you consider to be spam.
2. In the message click the three dots to get additional options.
3. From there you can select Block, Report Spam, or Report Phishing

Other Email Providers

Apple also has a vacation responder. Login to your icloud.com account, on any computer. This cannot be done through a phone or tablet. It can be done at a library on Windows or through most any web browser, Edge, Firefox, Chrome, Safari, or others.

In the vacation responder, enter the words “unsubscribe” {youremailaddress} like below:

unsubscribe youremailaddres@icloud.com

There are likely similar services in most other email providers such as Yahoo.com and Outlook.com. Look for a vacation responder and set it up!