SPAM

FIGHTING SPAM

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Fighting SPAM

We successfully block over 90% of all incoming spam using a variety of methods. Our email servers will not accept connections from email servers that are listed in the ORDB RBL (http://www.ordb.org/). The ORDB RBL is a list of every known open relay on the Internet. An open relay is a server that lets anybody send email to anybody else without any restrictions. Nearly all email from open relays is spam, so it is logical to block all emails from open relays so you don't even see it.

Email that is simply being received by local accounts (as opposed to getting relayed) is run through a SPAM filtering program called SpamAssissin. SpamAssassin can make a very well educated guess as to whether or not a given email is spam by looking for hundreds of different patterns common in known spam messages. SpamAssassin scores each messages as to how spammy the message is. If a message scores too spammy, then the message is considered spam.

What is SpamAssassin?

SpamAssassin(tm) is a mail filter to identify spam. It is used by all email domains hosted on CoastMS.

Using its rule base, it uses a wide range of heuristic tests on mail headers and body text to identify "spam", also known as unsolicited commercial email.

The spam-identification tactics used include:

header analysis: spammers use a number of tricks to mask their identities, fool you into thinking they've sent a valid mail, or fool you into thinking you must have subscribed at some stage. SpamAssassin tries to spot these.
text analysis: again, spam mails often have a characteristic style (to put it politely), and some characteristic disclaimers and CYA text. SpamAssassin can spot these, too.
blacklists: SpamAssassin supports many useful existing blacklists, such as mail-abuse.org, ordb.org or others.
Razor: Vipul's Razor is a collaborative spam-tracking database, which works by taking a signature of spam messages. Since spam typically operates by sending an identical message to hundreds of people, Razor short-circuits this by allowing the first person to receive a spam to add it to the database -- at which point everyone else will automatically block it.

Once identified, the mail is then tagged as spam for later filtering using your outlook program.

Setup Outlook to automatically delete SPAM.

Setup the following rule with the Rules wizard to move spam email from the Inbox to the Deleted Items folder.

Rule description:
Apply this rule after the message arrives
with X-Spam-Level: ** in the message header
delete it ( or permanently delete it)
and stop processing more rules

You can fine tune the rule to be tighter or looser. The more "*" asterisks the more spam you will receive. I have mine set to only two asterisks for maximum protection. I originally set the rule to do a simple delete that moves the messages into the deleted folder. That way you can review them before deleting them permanently. You may set the program to automatically permanently delete everything in the deleted folder when you exit the program. Tools, Options, Other, Empty the Deleted Items folder upon exiting.

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