Introduction
Spam has grown into a massive problem – not just at UW but nation-wide. Studies estimate that spam represents between 40 and 60 percent of all email. The spam problem is a difficult one to solve. Although spam filtering software is well developed, even the most sophisticated software occasionally misreads some legitimate messages, treating them like spam. Techniques used by spammers to evade spam filtering software are constantly evolving, as are the rules used to detect the spam. Users can expect to see some ebb and flow in the proportion of spam that is identified by filtering as spammers try new approaches, followed by updates to the filtering software to address those approaches.
Information Technology has reviewed various software alternatives to help reduce the flow of spam into the campus community. Based on available support, features, and cost, the IT anti-spam committee has chosen to provide Sophos Puremessage software on the central email gateway servers to help users manage spam. All email coming into campus from known spammer mail servers is rejected. By default, remaining email suspected to be spam is quarantined, and a daily email and a Web interface are provided to users for spam management. Optionally, users can instead have suspect messages marked as spam and delivered and then use email client rules to manage them or can opt-out altogether from central email gateway spam management.
Available to
This is available to faculty, staff, and students.
Procedure
If you receive an email that is suspicious, please click "Report Email" and include the suspicious email as an attachment.