How can I stop spam?
There are several different strategies that can be used to stop spam. It should be noted that there is no currently any effective way to stop 100% of spam. There are things that can be done to dramatically reduce the amount of spam that you get. Strategies include message rules, spam filters, spam traps, and understanding how to report spam to the appropriate provider (ISP).
Spam filters
An initial step in the fight against step is to use a quality spam filter that acts as a kind of "passport control". This highlights any incoming e-mail of a dubious source and allows you to decide whether you want to access it or bin it!A spam filter can either be provided by your ISP as part of your e-mail account, or you can buy your own spam-fighting software and install it on your PC. The advantage of the filter run by your service provider is that the dangerous and anoying e-mail is filtered before you even download your mail. The viruses, trojans and spam never reaches you. Also, you don't have to update any software as your ISP will be updating their filters with the latest signatures every few hours.
Message rules
Spam filters (both the desktop and the 'run on the mail server' type) allow you to set up a list of people that you trust - and a list of people that you don't. So if you find that messages from one of the people who legitimately e-mails you is being caught in the spam filter, you can add their e-mail address to your 'white list'. Conversely, if a spammer is regularly beating the filter, then you can add their address (or their domain) to the 'black list'.E-mail software such as Microsoft's Outlook also allows you to set up rules, such as 'dump all e-mails where the text includes "get rich"'. These are not very effective in fighting spam as spammers cleverly disguise the words that cause offense. You will find yourself endlessly adding more and more rules to beat the spammers, and the chances are they are devoting more time to winning than you are!
Spam filters use a more sophisticated approach. They check all the words in the message (and their misspellings) and score them as potential spam words. They look at where the e-mail came from and how it is constructed. They check if the source is on a known black list or is coming from a computer than is not a legitimate mail server. They can go through scores of different tests and eventually come up with a statistical value for the email being spam.
Are filters effective?
No spam filter is 100% effective. It is a constant battle between the spammers and the designers of the filters. However, a good spam filter should remove 80 - 90% of your spam.Some spam will get through. Also, filters will catch some legitimate e-mails and stop them. It is important, therefore, that spam messages are not automatically deleted. Ambit New Media's Spam Skip service sends a list of spam received (on a daily or weekly basis) so that you can check for any legitimate e-mail that has been trapped. This list is e-mailed to you and you can release any message from quarantine by simply clicking on the link provided.
Don't use a catch-all account
Some e-mail accounts are designed to catch any mail sent to the domain, regardless of the person named as the recipient. For example, for the domain companydomain.com you could set up e-mail accounts for each of your staff, but also include a catch-all account that would accept mail for anything@companydomain.com. So even if there wasn't a named account called sales@companydomain.com, the mail would still get through, as would mail sent to enquiries@..., info@....Catch-all accounts are very useful. Someone misspelling a recipient's name (for example, believing Toni is Tony and sending mail to tony@companydomain.com) will still get their mail delivered. Their big disadvantage is that spammers guessing account names - and automatically trying every name in a huge dictionary - will also get their message through. A 'dictionary attack' can generate many thousands of e-mails. And a catch-all account will, nor surprisingly, catch them all!
So, sadly, the disadvantages of a catch-all account outweigh their advantages. Turn yours off, and get your ISP to set up named accounts, appropriate aliases (to cope with common misspellings) and then reject all other mail.
