Fully spam/virus filtered mail, and reliable outbound relay

From: Jem Berkes (jb_at_users.pc9.org)
Date: 06/06/04 

Date: 6 Jun 2004 22:24:30 GMT

[ Why these 3 newsgroups: these have been my hangouts over the years,
and I know that spam filtering issue comes up frequently. Now that I
have the ability to demonstrate that spam is not really a problem any
more, I wish to share with people in my field/industry... ]

I am considering offering email services from my servers at pc9.org. This
might be of interest to people who are dissatisfied with their ISP's mail
services -- too slow/unreliable, trouble sending mail due to ISP being
listed on spam blocklists, or too many viruses/sending being received.

pc9.org has triple-homed connectivity from a data centre in California.
Our server is not listed on any spam blocklists. Incoming+outgoing mail
is aggressively filtered for viruses (no executable attachments allowed).

If you want to try out the mail services there is currently NO COST
during this testing phase. Contact jb@users.pc9.org (accounts will not be
given to everyone). The account will cost you nothing until June 30.
After that, fees will likely be $5/month for an account.

Here is what I currently offer:
+ POP3 mailbox (over SSL only), 20 MByte storage
+ Authenticated SMTP for relaying (over SSL only), small volumes only
+ SpamProbe or SpamBayes trainable spam filter, through a web interface.
  This way, you configure your own account to eliminate what you consider
  spam. Honestly, this is the most powerful spam filtering technology
  available today. After 50 - 100 messages of manual traning, the filter
  can automatically differentiate spam from non-spam with high accuracy.

FILTERING: I stress that * you * train the filter for your own account.
This means that you teach it over time what's spam, and what's not. When
properly trained it's unlikely that legitimate messages will be caught.
My own experience is only 1 false positive in 2000 emails.

An ideal user for these services would be someone who needs to reliably
send mail but who is dissatisfied with their ISP's mail relay.

- and/or -

Someone who gets too many viruses or spam, and dreams of an inbox that
would only contain legitimate messages. You could forward your existing
account@yourisp to account@users.pc9.org and pick up your mail from your
filtered mailbox on our servers. The filters work best if you get a
decent volume of both spam and non-spam. 

-- 
Jem Berkes <jb@users.pc9.org>
http://www.sysdesign.ca/

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Help, ntlers
    ... Account is with) will always get spam eMails like that (some Mail ... the ISP won't usually do much about it!!! ... Use more efficient Filtering. ...
    (uk.people.silversurfers)
  • Re: Another Linux Question
    ... The reason you haven't had much problem with viruses is that your ISP ... As far as linux and spam are concerned: ... distributions use sendmail to send/recieve email. ... greylisted sites and Bayesian content filtering to ...
    (sci.astro.amateur)
  • MSF antispam info
    ... Spam and fraudulent e-mail messages are major issues for computer users ... Exchange Server, and Microsoft Exchange Hosted Filtering. ... and personalized spam protection while reducing false positives. ...
    (comp.mail.misc)
  • MR: Webmail spam filters.
    ... the quality of the various spam filters oon each of my mail accounts. ... Currently I have Wanadoo, SpamCop and Gmail. ... like the NTL account it attracts a couple of hundred ... Up until recently I thought it a good account, filtering about ...
    (uk.comp.sys.mac)
  • Re: Non English Spam
    ... Subject: Non English Spam ... Also this means that later filtering on the first Received field is ... repeatedly blocks yahoomail, craigslist, and ebay because spammers ... If they want to filter Asian charsets, ...
    (freebsd-questions)