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UITS News - 2006


To: The University Community
From: University Information Technology Services
Date: 07 Aug 2006
Subject: UITS Announces The Implementation of New SPAM Filtering Devices

INTRODUCTION

Starting Monday August 14, three new spam appliances will process email originating from off-campus. These appliances will identify over 95% of the spam coming onto campus, as opposed to the 2% we currently identify. This improved service will require no action from you. Your email will function the same as before. However, you will now see more messages carrying the tag {SPAM?} in front of the email Subject.

While this change requires no action, you may find the following information useful.

SPAM TAGGING AND "WHITELISTING"

As mentioned above, email identified as spam will carry the tag {SPAM?} in front of the email Subject. There is a very slight chance that the spam appliances may incorrectly tag innocent mail as spam. You may want to review the tagged spam message's Sender and Subject to identify legitimate emails. The spam appliances divide the spam into normal spam and "high scoring" spam and tag the high scoring spam with the compound tag {SPAM?}{HIGH}. This email is almost certain to be spam.

If you find a valid email with the {SPAM?} tag, UITS can "whitelist" the Sender. This will validate all future mail from that Sender. It will never be tagged as spam again. Call the UITS Help Center (486-4357) if you need this service.

You can configure most email reading programs including Outlook, to recognize spam tagged with {SPAM?} and divert them to a separate folder, or even delete them. You can read about configuring Outlook this way at;

http://mail.exchange.uconn.edu/faq/clients/outlook/outlook2003/spamrule.htm

EMAIL FRAUD ("PHISHING")

"Phishing" is a type of spam that attempts to steal a user's identity. They do this by convincing people to log into a web site and submit their personal information such as Credit Card Number, Social Security Number, etc. This spam usually claims to be from a trusted institution such as a bank or brand name vendor. The new spam appliances are designed to find and block this type of spam. If you have been receiving this type of spam, you will find that its volume will be greatly reduced.

CONTACTS

Paul Desmarais, Manager
Server Support
University Information Technology Services

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