Spam is the use of electronic messaging systems to send unsolicited bulk messages indiscriminately.

While the most widely recognized form of spam is e-mail spam, the term is applied to abuses in other media such as: instant messaging spam, Usenet newsgroup spam, Web search engine spam, spam in blogs, wiki spam, online classified ads spam, mobile phone messaging spam, Internet forum spam, junk fax transmissions, social networking spam, television advertising and file sharing network spam.  It is named for Spam, a luncheon meat, from the Monty Python sketch in which Spam is included in almost every dish.