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Google Calendar Spam?

I think I'm hallucinating or something: it appears that I'm getting spam events added mysteriously to my Google Calendar schedule. What the heck? How is that happening, and how can I stop it occurring?


Dave's Answer:

You're not going insane, don't panic. It turns out that there is indeed a bit of a loophole in how Google Calendar accepts invitations from unknown parties, and in the last few weeks spammers have indeed figured out sneak ways to use that to add spam messages (events?) to your calendar.

The Google Calendar team even noted: "I'm really sorry to hear that you're receiving reminders for spammy events and seeing these events on your Google Calendar. The team hates spam just as much as you guys do and we're working hard to keep it out of Google Calendar."

Let's start at the beginning, though.

Here's what a spammy calendar event looks like:

Google Calendar Spam?  Yech!

In addition to the weird event name (I rarely have events that encourage me to contact a FEDEX COURIER) (which leads me to wonder why they don't have spammy event titles like "Meet Sue for Lunch downtown" which are more likely to be clicked upon than these idiotic titles. But maybe I shouldn't say anything?) the question mark icon denotes events that I'm invited to join but haven't yet accepted.

What you want to do to block these in the future is to disable public invitations. This is done by going to "Settings" then scrolling down until you see the following:

Fix/Solve/Stop Google Calendar Spam: Disable Public Invitations!

Simply change this from "Yes" to "No", save your new settings and you've stopped this problem recurring forever. Or at least until the next time those wily spammers figure out a workaround and bother us again.



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Comments

I bought a new small ASUS Eee PC computer that has Lynus?? operating system. How can I get to set up my web cam with MSN Live Messenger. I can get the Messenger part but my web cam does not start up and I do not have the menue that allows me to start a call.

Posted by: Tom at March 31, 2008 4:50 PM

This webpage has a redirect loop.

The webpage at http://www.google.com/calendar/render?gsessionid=C3kxFU7FeWiUipd-G2V3tQ has resulted in too many redirects. Clearing your cookies for this site may fix the problem. If not, it is possibly a server configuration issue and not a problem with your computer.
This error message appears when I try to access goolgle calendar. I can't find anything on the internet to help me solve this problem.

Posted by: Terry Turner at October 13, 2008 8:59 AM

I have something to say, now that you mention it, but ...
Starbucks coffee cup I do have a lot to say, and questions of my own for that matter, but first I'd like to say thank you for all your efforts on this Web site by buying you a cup of coffee!

I do have a comment, now that you mention it!











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