Last week, I received an unsolicited email from a person named Emma.

She said she worked for a “language learning app” and they were big fans of it. Podcast “Smashing Security” (Yeah, yeah…) And they want members of their team to come to the show.

They wouldn’t talk about anything related to cybersecurity, which makes me wonder if they’ve actually heard the podcast I co-host.

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Instead, here’s what they’re pitching (product names redacted because they don’t pay for advertising):

Topics such as Language Teaching, EdTech, Learning Science, and GPT-3 in Linguistics can be covered.

Since your podcast is in the tech space, your audience will likely be most interested in: [REDACTED]Our AI language chatbot powered by GPT-3 technology.

Hmm, that may or may not be interesting, but it feels a bit far from what “Smashing Security” listeners want to hear.

What annoys me is that not only does this spam land in my email inbox, but when I go into Google Drive, I find that they also shared an unwanted 3-page proposal document with me. I understand.

Drive unwanted shared files
Junk files shared on Google Drive

Ars Technica well explained Unsolicited file sharing on Google Drive:

Drive will show you shared files in your Shared Documents folder, notify you of shares on your phone, highlight “new and recent files” at the top of the Drive interface, list files in searches, and email you about them. I will send. No indication that you know the file sharer at all.

Good news for those who are annoyed by Google Drive files shared by strangers. google drive get spam folder.

spam report
Spam reporting options in Google Drive

Google says that once users move a junk file to their spam folder, they won’t receive any further notifications about the file, and the file won’t appear anywhere outside the spam folder. Google also determines if a file is unwanted and automatically moves it to his spam folder, just like it does with email spam.

If a file stays in your Google Drive spam folder for more than 30 days, it will be permanently deleted.

Indeed, in my particular instance, the file was shared as part of a clumsy attempt to promote an inappropriate company on a popular podcast.But in the past there have been reports of Abusive ex-partner abuses Google Drive.

Others have reported being shared files containing ads, pornographic content, dating scams, and malware.

The Google Drive shared file spam problem may not be as big a problem as email spam or instant messaging spam, but Google is waking up to the problem and developing a solution to help users not be overwhelmed with unwanted communications. is good.

Did you enjoy this article? Follow Graham Cluley on Twitter again Mastodon To read more of the exclusive content we post,


Graham Cluley is an antivirus industry veteran who has worked for many security companies since the early 1990s when he created the first version of Dr. Solomon’s Antivirus Toolkit for Windows. He is now an independent security he makes regular media appearances as an analyst and an international speaker on the subject of computer he security, hackers and online he privacy. follow him on twitter @gcluleyin Mastodon @[email protected]or send him an email.

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