Anti-Spam Recommendations

Gareth · 30-08-2005, 11:22

A friend of mine is looking for an anti-spam solution for his parents. I don't use any (no need to strangely enough... touch wood) and have only heard of one product called MailWasher.

Which products do others use (if any), and would you recommend it?

TIA

DocDutch · 30-08-2005, 11:39

I use Spamfighter (www.spamfighter.com) and I have to say that it doesnt let much through...it all drops in outlook to a folder it creates for itself, also this proggie is a freebie and working with outlook 2003 its a bliss

ntl customer · 30-08-2005, 12:09

If they use Outlook (not express) then you can use SpamBayes.

http://spambayes.sourceforge.net/

It's pretty effective in detecting and canning spam, and doesn't need much configuration - it will "teach" itself from scanning folders of legit messages and spam messages.

If any spam messages do end up in your inbox/legit emails end up in the spam box then it's pretty easy to tell the system that this email is/is not spam - you just need select the message(s) and hit the this is spam/not spam button.

30-08-2005, 12:29

Why not use NTL's own spam software, it worksok for me, I used to get 200 + a day spam now I get none.

Mike · 30-08-2005, 12:31

I use spampal......I set it so it deletes spam it the server so I do not even see it

and thus there is no user intervention once set

Mike

Gareth · 30-08-2005, 12:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nidge

Why not use NTL's own spam software, it worksok for me, I used to get 200 + a day spam now I get none.

afaik they're not on ntl

DocDutch · 30-08-2005, 13:35

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mike

I use spampal......I set it so it deletes spam it the server so I do not even see it

and thus there is no user intervention once set

Mike

thats a nice setup but say a mates email gets on your spamlist then your kinda screwed if he sends you anything

Mal · 30-08-2005, 14:25

Okay not a specific anti-spam application and it means changing email clients, but I use Mozilla Thunderbird and the junk email function on that doesn't miss a trick. It puts the junk into a junk folder, which you can set to delete after so many days. It does learn from what you say is junk.

Just a suggestion, as it's free.

ntl customer · 30-08-2005, 17:55

Quote:

Originally Posted by levig

thats a nice setup but say a mates email gets on your spamlist then your kinda screwed if he sends you anything

Yes, that's a problem with computers - you should never trust them to do things automatically, especially when it comes to filtering and deleting of emails.

It's bound to do things you don't want it to - for example, before I got SpamBayes I set up an Outlook rule that automatically moved messages to the spam folder and used a keyword based list - so where it detected certain keywords that you get in spam it would automatically get shunted into the spam folder.

However, this meant that some quite legit emails from friends got binned by accident, and as I don't always check the spam folder often it wasn't until around a week or so later until I read and replied to their message.

Sometimes, it's quite easy to fall foul of the anti-spam filters inadvertently by writing in a certain way, by using phrases or keywords which the machine defines as "spam" or indeed by using certain configurations in your email program.

martinell · 30-08-2005, 22:33

Mailwasher is very good even though its not free anymore. did have a linky for the free version somewhere

ah ha....found it