I use Hotmail (free) and often when I get emails from an AOL email addy, they won't open for me. Not sure why. They aren't anything like wonderful pics being shared, but rather things from the net that have been forwarded and forwarded, and forwarded...all with the names and addresses. What are the email programs involved? Are you maybe able to see the pics at the actual on line email site before or after they are downloaded to Thunderbird? Have you narrowed it down to it being Thunderbird for sure? Sue

jewels- I assume you are actively dealing with the identity theft because it can cause many long-term problems. A while back a friend passed on some useful information concerning what to do in case of loss of a wallet or purse. I'm sure you have done all this, but I thought I'd post it to help others who are in the same situation: WHAT TO DO IF YOU LOSE YOUR PURSE OR WALLET We've all heard horror stories about fraud that's committed using your name, address, SS#, credit, etc. Unfortunately I (the author of this piece) have firsthand knowledge, because my wallet was stolen last month and within a week the thieve(s) ordered an expensive monthly cell phone package, applied for a VISA credit card, had a credit line approved to buy a Gateway computer, received a PIN number from DMV to change my driving record information online, and more. But here's some critical information to limit the damage in case this happens to you or someone you know. As everyone always advises, cancel your credit cards immediately, but the key is having the toll free numbers and your card numbers handy so you know who to call. Keep those where you can find them easily (having to hunt for them is additional stress you WON'T need at that point!). File a police report immediately in the jurisdiction where it was stolen, this proves to credit providers you were diligent, and is a first step toward an investigation (if there ever is one). But here's what is perhaps most important: call the three national credit reporting organizations immediately to place a fraud alert on your name and SS#. This will help prevent identity theft, which can be a much bigger headache than all of the other stuff combined. I had never heard of doing that until advised by a bank that called to tell me an application for credit was made over the Internet in my name. The alert means any company that checks your credit knows your information was stolen and they have to contact you by phone to authorize new credit. By the time I was advised to do this - almost 2 weeks after the theft all the damage had been done (there are records of all the credit checks initiated by the thieves' purchases, none of which I knew about before placing the alert). Since then, no additional damage has been done, and the thieves threw my wallet away this weekend (someone turned it in). It seems to have stopped them in their tracks. The numbers are: Equifax 1-800-525-6285 Experian (formerly TRW) 1-800-301-7195 Trans Union 1-800-680-7289 Social Security Administration also has a fraud line at 1-800-269-0271

ok do you have your friends/ colleges email info set up in your address book in your email client? If you have an address book set up with the email address of the people you want to send email to then you should never have to type in their address in the send to area. just click on the address book and select them from there and choose to send to. Most email clients allow you to just click on the TO: at the top of the email form and it automatically opens the address book for you to click on all the names you want to add to that email(it looks like on incredimail there is a little envelope looking thing next to the TO: you would click on that), it will send the email to all the ones you select. When you are doing that, sending to multiple people it is courteous to use the BCC feature instead of the TO feature that way the names and addresses will not be shown to everyone, blind carbon copy. It keeps your friends info private. I know nothing about incredimail but every email client is pretty similar so those methods should work. To create a group you can usually do that in your address book area, select new then group, go down the list in your address book ticking off the people you want in that new group. it will add them to the new group but leave them in your regular address book too. When you want to send the email to everyone in that group just go to your address book and select that group to send to. Please click here to read about using BCC in incredimail To, cc or Bcc this site might be helpful Incredimail Tutorials this is something everyone should know how to do with their email client, if you should ever be asked to provide the headers of an email for evaluation as to where it came from or if there were problems. This tutorial shows how. Viewing email headers in Incredimail

Mike I am not sure setting up rules does much except offer peace of mind in the sort term. Spam is very invasive and the simplest way to control it is to safeguard your email address and delete all spam without opening any of it. Never show your email address where it can be seen by all and sundry, never open or reply to Spam, not even to be removed from the list because that simply tells them they have found a valid address to bug. If you are curious about a sender you can go in the back door as see what is written and who sent it. To see this right click on the email header in your inbox click Properties click Details click Message source. Now take this to full screen and look carefully, you will see the sender, the content message if there is one and rows and rows if seemingly gibberish. This gibberish is actually a picture usually. Be sure to do this is you get a returned email, it may not be returned but another spam ploy. I have provided a link below that might answer a few questions, it is Canadian but I suspect our issues are no different to yours. Here is a link that might be useful: Stopping Spam tips