Exchange Spam Blocker

Spam is a reality of the Internet, but not all users suffer from it at the same extent. It is definitely hard for businesses to distinguish valuable messages from unsolicited emails. For business and personal assistance alike, software companies have created special anti-spam programs meant to block the access of unsolicited mail to inbox in more than 90% of cases. Released by Microsoft in May 2004, the Exchange spam blocker is a smart tool designed for mailbox protection. The target market for this product consists of individual users and companies that receive unsolicited commercial emails in very large numbers.

Microsoft Smart Screen technology stays at the basis of the Exchange spam blocker as it is essential for the identification of the nature of the message. The access of the unsolicited mail messages can thus be stopped at the mailbox or at the gateway depending on the settings. Other Microsoft tools were used before the launch of Exchange spam blocker. At present, Microsoft no longer provides updates for the former intelligent filters, in a clustered environment. The present version of the Exchange spam blocker is capable of stopping spam in the tracks, allowing for good business development.

The Exchange spam blocker relies on a combination of techniques meant to identify the messages that could be spam; thus, other than the use of the Bayes filter, the tool scans the messages for spam keywords and analyzes the spam headers. After the identification of the spam messages, it is up to the computer user to decide whether to keep or delete the messages. There are models of the Exchange spam blocker that actually inform a sender whether his or her message has been treated as spam despite its inherent legitimacy. Plus, the advantages of preventing spam directly on server before reaching the computer are manifold: less virus attacks and no malware unauthorized installation.

To sum it up, most of the tasks required for small business operations and personal usage should be covered by using the Exchange spam blocker. An issue with the 2003 version of the blocker consisted in the impossibility to import or export blocked messages or send domains. One further inconvenience is that the user has no clue about how much spam gets blocked and how well filters are functioning. It is crucial to check the settings and learn about the best mode to operate with the tool so that you can maximize the usage of your anti-spam tool.

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Get Rid of Spam - Protect Your Inbox From Unwanted Junk Emails

NO-spam often becomes a rule of efficient web communications. It is a real nightmare to open the inbox and find dozens if not hundreds of spam messages and start sorting them to identify valuable mail from unsolicited messages. There are strategies, tools and tactics that can assist you in the attempt to get rid of spam without any investment or trouble at all.

Two separate email accounts should be created, one that can be used without restrictions and a real one that works just for private and business purposes. Whenever you enter a page or website that needs registration, you can enter that email in order to get access. The private email address should remain private even when you have a website that you actively work on. You can get rid of spam if you know how to organize your professional email address.

You can further get rid of spam on the professional email address by installing a good spam filter or blocker so that it detects unsolicited messages. Even so, do not open messages received from people you do not know professionally or whom haven't contacted you otherwise. Some spam emails have a notice of receipt function and if you confirm them, you simply encourage spammers to continue their activity.

Forwarded emails make another clever strategy used by spammers to collect long lists of email addresses. A spammer sends a funny message, a warning or some other catchy message and asks you to share it with friends. The emails that accumulate through such circulation are later collected by spammers. When you don't answer to forwarded messages you make one step further to get rid of spam.

Anti-spam tools are a very efficient way to keep unwanted emails away if they are supported by preventive measures as well. Depending on the features available and the selected settings, a software can get rid of spam more or less efficiently. Consider such issues carefully for a safer and improved communication with friends and business contacts.

Updates of filters and blockers are definitely crucial when you try to get rid of spam with maximum of results. Spammers constantly adapt to the blocking settings of the tools, and the features of both malicious and protective software vary and improve every day. The validity and efficiency of a protective tool has limitations because of the improvements corresponding to the rapidly changing world of the Internet.

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Dealing With Spam - Making Secondary Email Accounts

Most people have all sorts of spam and junk mail problems in their email account. It can get to a point where using your email is frustrating since there is more mail you don't want than mail you do want. There is a strategy that can help with this problem, and the sooner you adopt it the better.

If you currently are getting tons of spam and junk mail, it's because people who do this to you have got your email address somehow. You have probably put your email address into some sort of email form or used it to create accounts on blogs and websites. Most people are genuine in the fact they don't share your email, but all it takes is one to sell or give your email address away for you to get tons of spam. The longer you have your email address the worse the problem tends to become.

One strategy is to make secondary email accounts. These are not ones you use for business or personal purposes but to sign up on sites and give your email address away for information. This means that if someone that you give this email to starts to send junk mail or spam, it doesn't matter, as it doesn't go to your main or "real" account.

You can create secondary accounts in many ways. Often your ISP will let you create several, or if you have a Web site and hosting your hosting company will typically let you create all you want. They are also plenty of free email services that will work quite well, including Gmail and Hotmail among others.

Your personal account will be used just for people that you actually email back and forth. Your secondary account will be for offers and other things. When in doubt, use your secondary account. When this box has too much spam to deal with, delete it and make another one.

Since email accounts are free take advantage of using more than one so that your personal email box doesn't have so many problems. Note that if your email box currently gets tons of spam making a secondary account won't make your email box clear up. You may have to make a new personal email account that has never been found by the spammers. This should help you with email and spam issues that you are facing. Of course some people may never get the word and keep email your old account, so only do this as a last resort.

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Efficient Spam Detection

There are two levels of spam detection, one at the level of the server and another on the personal computer, depending on where the filters have been installed. Spam detection has become a necessity because the number of unsolicited mail messages is on the rise. Even if illegal, the action of spamming is conducted by very many dishonest businesses that use the world wide wed to hide their identity and dupe as many people as possible. Spam prevention and spam detection remain the only ways to limit the impact of spam for the moment.

Spam prevention is pretty basic: do not disclose your email address easily. This means that you must not enter the email address on web pages that require registration; better get a secondary address and use that for the purpose. Do not respond to unknown senders, and resist the temptation of sharing funny messages with friends by forwarding emails. On the other hand, the installation of the software blocking tools is necessary for the efficient spam detection.

Blockers and filters perform spam detection. First of all, filters separate legitimate messages from possible spam. Blockers are tools that don't allow the spam access to the personal computer. When the anti-spam software is installed on the server, things are even better because the viewing of the emails with a spam potential is possible without their being transferred in the computer memory. Detecting spam is now possible on the basis of the sender's ID, the keywords specific to spamming and several other criteria integrated in the technology.

The means for spam detection constantly improve, so do the spammers' means to fool blockers and filters and get into people's mail box. The truth is that so far, no software program has been invented to actually detect and stop spam 100%. It is also not known whether things will ever be different for the matter and whether there will be more than 99% anti-spam protection available. If kept at this level, spam is not that much a problem, on condition that the mails whose sender you don't know be deleted.

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An Easy Guide to Understanding Spam Filters

Spam filters can be considered a boon or a bane depending on which side of the bulk email marketing exercise you are. The industry itself started out with there being little semblance of a difference between spammers and genuine marketers, with both parties indiscriminately marketing to all and sundry. Such practices caused the separation of two groups eventually but the stigma remains for both. It is this stigma that is manifest in the result of spam filters aggressively filtering out email from both parties, especially if the information is unsolicited. So, what are these filtering mechanisms and how do they work?

Think about getting through a busy day with appointments with important people and sometimes ad hoc. How do you know which is a genuine meeting of your concern and which is a bother and a waste of time? You would scan the agenda of each meeting and accordingly plan your way out. This is exactly what a spam filter will do. It will scan each mail that comes into your inbox for possible spam content.

Spam filters nowadays filter using complex mathematical functions like the Bayesian method and Markovian discrimination. Both of these methods try and scan a mail for words that are indications of spam. Just the same that it takes you not more than a second of reading a subject line or a mail ID to identify mail, the software will scan your entire mail in the same time and compute a score. Based on this score, the mail may be left alone or sent to the spam folder. Bayesian method-based spam filters check for single words and those using Markovian discrimination scan entire phrases. It is the contribution of both of these mechanisms that has actually caused the overall reduction in spam traffic over the years to a point where you may not even encounter a spam mail unless you venture into a spam folder.

For genuine marketers, avoiding spam filtering mechanisms is an art. The first thing you need to do is to correct subject lines and follow internet etiquette. Do not shout and do not write "Dear." Always keep it as professional as you can. If you are sending an HTML mail, you should never use colors that are too loud. Try to emulate the designs of the legitimate mails that you receive.

Another point that cannot be underemphasized when dealing with spam filters is to always source your email databases from a trusted source and preferable after the user opts-in. This can be done by asking users if they would like to receive newsletter updates by email. One confirmation mail sent will take care of any possibility of the mail ending up in the spam folder. Even if it does, the customer will retrieve it and your mails from that point would be immune to checks by the filtering mechanisms. Acquiring email addresses by just buying CDs off a spammer is a sure way to get your IP blacklisted. Even if this does not happen, the user's better judgment just might get you.

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Methods to Avoid Spam - In Fact, Kill Spam in 10 Minutes Or Less For Free

Do not take the spam as an easy issue. It may create lots of troubles in your website, if you fail to attend to it immediately. This is my personal experience. I just ignored all these basic things while setting up my website. The result was that I was forced to spend huge dollars and my valuable time to buy anti-spam software. Here is my personal experience on how I got affected by spam mails.

The major mistake I did was leaving my e-mail id in the website. I thought this would be convenient for my customers to contact me. So, when the customers click the reply link it will open a new message box, where, to address will be stored automatically. I thought with this facility my customers can contact me, but did not think of the spammers. Along with genuine clients, some spammers entered my site and gathered all my personal details. The result is I am frequently getting spam messages in my mail box instead of genuine business mails.

I got the solution accidentally, when I was browsing the internet in search of a product. I just tried to click the link of the e-mail ID, but instead of e-mail ID I found a graphic design. This is the latest technology used to separate spam bots and genuine customers. I understood that spammers cannot harvest the information from these sites and now I too have this technique in my site.

Here are some of the best solutions I came to know to avoid spam.

* You can use CAPTCHA to verify the visitor's information. This is the method of typing the letters and numbers disguised in random pictures.

* You can replace the e-mail hyperlinks with graphic designs. In this method your e-mail ID will not be disclosed and cannot be harvested. The spam bots will again have to do image typing which takes more time. By that time the spam bots will leave your site.

* You can use auto responders in your site to escape from the bots. Auto responders will send the users messages along with your real e-mail address. And through this method, only genuine users can contact you. Bots will be filtered by the autoresponders.

Conclusion:

The best ways to stop spam bots are: using Java Script and Mod_Rewrite. These are the two techniques that can block the spambots and spy bots from harvesting your e-mail address and other personal information. Java script is easy to use, but Mod_rewrite system needs some technical knowledge.

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