When you open your electronic mail, you may find information about how to buy medicine, cheap airline tickets, books, computer products, and so on. There may also be offers for investment deals, bank loans and special holidays. However, to many computer users, this use of electronic spam to sell products has become a major problem as it makes computer communication more difficult. Many companies that want to send a great deal of advertising at the same time might use the services of a "spammer". A spammer is a person or company that uses computers to send out millions of copies of the same sales information. Spammers get people's e-mail addresses from websites, news groups and "chat rooms" where people send messages to each other. Most spam is sent by companies that are trying to get you to buy their products. Some of these are honest companies that may offer good products or services for fair prices. These companies can offer their products for a cheaper price than you might find in a store. However, much of the spam on the Internet is sent by criminals(罪犯) who are trying to sell products that do not exist or offer services they will not provide at all. What they are only interested in is stealing your money. When you answer their spam you find you are expected to send them money and receive a gift. If you just follow what they ask you to do without any consideration, it is likely that you will be cheated and lose some money.

单选题 What does the word "spam" in the last sentence of the first paragraph probably refer to?

【正确答案】 A

【答案解析】解析：第一段最后一句指出，对许多计算机用户来说，使用电子spam来销售产品已经成为一个主要的问题，因为它会导致计算机通信变得更为困难。第二段首句接着又提到，许多公司可能通过“spatamer”的服务同时发送大量广告。由此可以推断，spam一词有“垃圾信息”的意思，所以A)为本题答案。

单选题 Spammers are those people or companies that______.

【正确答案】 D

【答案解析】解析：第二段第二句以下定义的形式介绍了spammer：spammer是指那些利用计算机发送大量相同销售信息的个人或公司。选项D)中的the same sales information能在原文中找到相同的表述，因此D)为本题答案。

单选题 Why do some companies send spam?

【正确答案】 B

【答案解析】解析：第三段第一句提到，大多数垃圾电子邮件的发送者都是那些想方设法让你购买其产品的公司。换句话说，这些公司发送垃圾电子邮件是为了在网络上推销产品，因此B)是本题的答案。

单选题 According to the writer, how can we deal with spam?

【正确答案】 A

【答案解析】解析：由第三段可知，大多数垃圾电子邮件的目的是推销产品，虽然其中有些邮件是由讲诚信的公司发出的，但是很多垃圾电子邮件是由试图诈骗的犯罪分子发出的，其目的是诈骗钱财。因此，对于电脑上接收到的垃圾电子邮件，我们要小心对待，由此确定A)为本题的答案。

单选题 What is the author's main purpose of writing this passage?

【正确答案】 C

【答案解析】解析：本题考查这篇文章的写作目的，可以通过分析文章的内容得出答案。文章首先谈到垃圾电子邮件在网络上泛滥，然后介绍了垃圾电子邮件的发送者和发送途径等，最后重点介绍发送垃圾电子邮件的目的和可能带来的问题。由此可以看出，本文旨在提醒广大读者注意垃圾电子邮件可能带来的问题和潜在危险。因此，C)为本题的答案。