spam why bother?

The people that write spam emails are mostly from criminal backgrounds that are out to try and steal money or identities somewhere along the line. They come from all countries and so some techniques and language used is more sophisticated than from other places. All it takes is for one or two people to be fooled or to reply saying leave me alone for them to know the address is active and spam even more. Worse they may even be able to get into the address books and it just spreads like wild fire. The only thing we can really do is get a spam filter, not great but better than nothing.

There's no point in that ... Or well maybe if they try to have you contact them with your account information and stuff like that, then they are just trying to scam you...

yes, the point is when someone reply their email and contact them. Then they start to cheat the person who believe in them. They are BIG SPAMMERs...

They are harvesting email addresses. They send out garbage or often time blank emails to see if they bounce back. That way they can see if an email is still valid. Then they can sell the list as "fresh" and workable. If someone was looking to buy email addresses, they want at least 90% verifiable as active.

Some emails like that generally ask you to contact them back, and they will not ask you to provide your account number right away. They will first build a confidence relation with you before asking for anything. I had the opportunity to see the inner workings of an insurance company, and they operate this way.

Anyway, I get spam very rarely as I use Thunderbird and it has a very efficient spam filter.