|
Choose from an option below:
What is Spam?
Spam is the mass distribution of unsolicited media (usually commercial) through electronic means. This would encompass posting messages by e-mail, newsgroups, message boards and/or chat rooms. Although Spam covers a wide range of electronic medium, it is linked mainly with e-mail and may also be referred to as Unsolicited Bulk E-mail (UBE), or Unsolicited Commercial E-mail (UCE).
[ back to top ]
Why is Spam bad?
Aside from the obvious annoyance of a clutered inbox, in many cases, Spam contains content not suitable for all audiences. It's common for adult websites to send Spam that may not only offend recipients but might also be viewed by children who accidentally stumble across it.
[ back to top ]
How did I get Spam? It's not even addressed to me?
A common misconception is that, in order for you to receive an e-mail, your e-mail address must be listed in the To, CC, or BCC field of an e-mail. This is not the case. Those entries are just lines of text that can say anything the sender desires. The true recipient is determined by what's called the "envelope recipient." The envelope recipient is determined when your mail client interacts with the mail server via SMTP. 99% of the time, the envelope recipient is going to be what is in the To line of the e-mail. However, people who send out Spam use modified mail clients that report one thing in the To line, but report a completely different envelope recipient to the mail server.
Here's a useful analogy: getting an e-mail is somewhat like getting a business letter. When you receive a business letter, the intended recipient's address is usually in the text of the letter. You open such a letter one day, and realize you've received something that wasn't intended for you! You look at the envelope, and it was addressed to you, but when you look at the letter, you've never heard of the addressee.
It's the same with Spam. You don't see the address on the outside of the envelope, you only see the address included on the letter. Under normal circumstances, when someone is legitimately mailing you, the addresses will match up, but people who are sending Spam have to be sneaky.
[ back to top ]
How did they get my e-mail address?
There are many ways spammers get your e-mail address. Any time you give out your e-mail address, you take the risk of getting on a Spam distribution list.
The most common ways are:
- entering your e-mail address in a form, whether it's paper or an online webpage form
- legitimate mailing / subscription lists
- posting to newsgroups;
- registering domains
- occasionally businesses that are going bankrupt will sell their customer information to other companies for income, which could include e-mail addresses.
Once your e-mail address gets on a list, it then gets copied, sold, combined with other lists and resold, and the cycle keeps repeating. Basically, once you end on up any list, you're going to start to get a lot of Spam.
[ back to top ]
How do I get off Spam distribution lists?
The short answer: you can't. If you manage to get off of one, you'll still be on so many others that the effort will not seem worth it. You might see Spam that includes instructions for you to be removed from their list; unless the sender is a legitimate enterprise the instructions aren't to get off of the list - they're to confirm that your e-mail address is valid. This will lead to more Spam.
For instance, if you get a random e-mail that says "MAKE CASH FAST!" with instructions on how to remove address from the list, following those instructions just tells the spammer that your e-mail address is indeed valid. A single confirmed e-mail address is worth ten unconfirmed e-mail addresses to a spammer, so it will get bought and sold even more. Be prepared for a deluge of Spam.
However, if you purchased something from buy.com, and two months later buy.com sent you an e-mail advertising a special, and at the bottom it says, "Please follow this link to prevent any future e-mails" - that would probably be legitimate. Following those instructions will most likely get you removed from buy.com's list.
[ back to top ]
What can I do to avoid Spam?
The best way to avoid Spam is to not get on the distribution lists at all. Be selective where you give your e-mail address or, if it is required, you can give a false address, or create an additional e-mail address you use exclusively for giving to vendors. If it's too late, your best bet is to create a filter in your e-mail software.
[ back to top ]
Does Xecunet filter any Spam?
Yes. Xecunet decided that, when we put our spam
filters in place in late 1999, we would use filters that were as aggressive as possible, while minimizing the chance of blocking legitimate e-mail. Since
then we have been upgrading the quality of our spam filters to stay a step ahead of the spammers. We recently upgraded our spam filtering system to
incorporate Spamassassin. Spamassassin is a highly regarded spam filtration system that scans each and every
email message that goes through our server. It subjects each message to thousands of tests looking for similarities to known spam. Each test has an
assigned a point value based on how significant the test is and often it is found in known spam messages. Once all the tests are run, the points are
totaled and the point value is assigned to the email message. The message's point total is then compared against the recipients spam filter settings which
are also based on this point system, to determine which zone the message belongs to. These zones are what determines what happens to the message.
There are 3 zones (low, medium, and high) which represent the probability of the message to be Spam. If the point value of the message falls into
the low zone (not Spam), the message will be delivered as normal. If it falls within the medium zone (probable Spam), the message (with the default spam filter settings) will have "***SPAM*** inserted into its subject line, then delivered as normal. If the message falls into the high zone (Spam), the message is rejected by the server, back to the sender.
[ back to top ]
What do the different levels of spam filters do?
There are four different levels for the spam filter aggressiveness: Conservative, Normal, Aggressive and Militant. Each level raises or lowers the threshold between the 3 aforementioned zones. The higher the level the more spam will be blocked, but as a trade off, it may be more likely to block legitimate mail.
[ back to top ]
How do I adjust my spam filters?
The spam filter settings can be adjusted directly from our webpage by going to the "Your Account" section of our website, and clicking the option to "Manage your email accounts" and log in with your email address and password. Select the option to "Adjust Spam filter settings". Here there will be 3 options, toggle the spam filters on or off, adjust the aggressiveness of the spam filters, and the default action for probable spam. The probable spam which is the medium zone, by default it is set to add ***SPAM*** to the subject line, but this can also be set to reject these messages back to the sender.
At the bottom of the page you will see there is also an option for a Whitelist and a Blacklist. Any mail coming to you from an address that is listed in the whitelist will automatically completely bypass the spam filtering system. This is good for those newsletters you wish to receive which keep getting tagged as probably spam, but also works for any other senders that keep getting caught by the filter. All mail to you from an address listed in your blacklist is automatically rejected back to the sender. Email addresses can be added or removed from each list.
[ back to top ]
How else can I filter out unwanted mail?
Most e-mail programs have a feature that can filter your mail. Depending on the e-mail program, this can be located in different places and you should consult the Help menu to find it. The filters can help you set up your mail program to automatically remove messages based on programmed criteria. There are many different ways you can set up the filters. You can set up them up to remove any mail that has a certain word or phrase in the subject line. You can filter out message from a certain sender or domain name. We have found that the best solution is setting up a filter to remove messages that are not sent To, or CCed to your address. If you recall in the "How did I get this?" section, most of the spam does not have your address in the To or CC field, and most of the legitimate e-mail you receive does. The only down side to this filter is if someone you want to receive a message from is sending it to you by BCC, or you are on a legitimate mailing list, then you may not receive those messages. To set up this filter, make sure every e-mail address you have is specified in the filter. If you only have one e-mail address, then you need only include that address. Once again, you can consult the Help menu in your mail program for more information.
[ back to top ]
|
