How to deal with spam problem?

There are three areas to cover:

How to avoid spam?

• Avoid posting your e-mail address on ANY public websites (this includes any type of message boards, newsgroups and your website). Spammers use special software to pick-up e-mail addresses automatically. If you really need to post your e-mail address, try to disguise it in a form of you at yourdomain.co.uk or you (at) yourdomain.co.uk.
• Be careful when mass-forwarding to your friends as this will expose your and others email addresses, and remember, NEVER forward any chain letter e-mails as the one below:
  
  Subject: This is not a chain! It could save a little girls life! o.k. you guys
  
  ..... this isn't a chain letter, but a choice for all of us to save a little girl that's dieing of a serious and fatal form of cancer. please send this to everyone you know...or don't know at that. this little girl has 6 months left to live her life, and as her dieing wish, she wanted to send a chain letter telling everyone to live their life to fullest, since she never will. she'll never make it to prom, graduate from high school, of get married and have a family of her own. but by you sending this to as many people as possible, you can give her and her family a little hope, because with every name that this is semnt to, the american cancer society will donate 3 cents per name to her treatment and recovery plan. one guy sent this th 500 people !!!! so, i know that we can send it to at least 5 or 6. come on you guys.... and if you're too damn selfish to waste 10-15 minutes and scrolling this and forwarding it to EVERYONE, than one: you're one sick bastard, and two: just think it could be you one day....and it's not even your $money$, just your time. i know that ya'll will impress me !!!! i love ya'll !!!!! peace-
  
  Sarah "X"

[back to top]

How to filter spam e-mails?

As a client of Kiswebs you have an anti-spam filter already installed on our server, but if you are still finding too many spam e-mails in your inbox, you may consider installing an anti-spam software and applying spam rules in your e-mail client.

In most e-mail clients (i.e Outlook Express) you should be able to create special rules to filter your e-mails.

Spam Filtering in Microsoft Outlook 2003

In Microsoft Outlook 2003 you simply go to Tools > Junk Options (on Preferences tab). You will see a list of 'general' junk e-mail options:

• No Automatic Filtering essentially turns off the junk e-mail filter.
• Low will only filter junk e-mail if it scores a high spam confidence level (SCL) rating.
• High will filter junk e-mail if it scores a medium SCL rating. The lower the rating, the less likely the e-mail is spam, so choose this option if you still get too many e-mails not recognised as spam by Microsoft Outlook.
• Safe Lists Only turns off the junk e-mail filter and will only allow e-mail to be delivered to your inbox if the sender or the recipient is listed in the "Safe Senders" and "Safe Recipients" lists (available in next tabs). You might use this option if you receive e-mails only from your friends and family. This may be fine for personal e-mail but this is definitely not an option for businesses attracting new customers.
• The last option allows you to Permanently delete junk e-mail. If, after you have been using the junk e-mail filter for some time, you notice that the filter has never filtered one of your legitimate e-mails into the Junk E-mail folder, then you might consider simply deleting the filtered spam e-mail rather than keeping a copy for your review. We do not recommend to choose this option if you have not tested the spam filter yet.

You can also create Safe Senders, Safe Recipients and Blocked Senders lists. In most versions of Microsoft Outlook 2003 you should be able to see also International Tab where you can specify a country from which you don't wont to receive emails anymore. This may be useful if you are dealing only with UK customers as the majority of spam e-mails comes from other countries.

Now you can go Tools > Rules and Alerts > New Rule ... > Move messages with specific words in the subject to a folder. You will find that many spam emails start with "Dear Friend" so you could add this as a rule for your e-mails. You should also browse through your spam e-mails and see what they usually contain in the subject line (i.e. "watches").

[back to top]

Spam Filtering in Outlook Express 6

Adding spam filter rules is simmilar in other e-mail clients. In Outlook Express it is even simplier. To add a spam filtering rule go to Tools > Message Rules > Mail.

[back to top]

Anti-spam software

Anti-spam software will help you filter the spam in far more advanced ways with a more accurate outcome. There is a great number of anti-spam software on the market, some of it is free, while you will need to pay for others and it may be hard to find something reliable.

We recommend you use one of anti-spam software listed on the following website – West Coast Labs. All products have been fully tested and certified by West Coast Labs, a company specialised in functionality testing, performance validation and the Checkmark Certification of information security products and services.

[back to top]

Don't respond to spam e-mails!

Please remember to NOT reply or follow "remove me from the mailing list" instructions if you suspect an e-mail to be spam. Responding in any way to spammers will verify your e-mail address as "active and valid" and will result in getting even more spam!

Kiswebs Support

Please note that even we have put a great amount of effort in securing your e-mail accounts from spam, we cannot guarantee you will not receive spam e-mails. Therefore it is advisable to follow the steps above and to make sure your e-mail address is not exposed to spammers.

Kiswebs do not provide support and are not responsible for any e-mail or anti-spam software mentioned on this website. If you are having any technical problems with it, please contact your software manufacturer.

If you are a Kiswebs client and you are still unsure about what you should do to prevent your e-mail account getting spam e-mails, please feel free to contact Kiswebs Technical Support Team by calling on 0141 332 7568 or via e-mail using a contact form on our website.

If you are NOT a Kiswebs client and would like to find out how to become a client then please contact us explaining your requirements.

[back to top]