Have spam filters been trained over XMAS?
In all the forums and on Usenet many, many people are complaining about the increasing volume of spam getting through without the [-SPAM-] tagging. Plusnet have encouraged people to keep reporting it and I've seen plenty of people saying they have been doing just that. But it doesn't seem to be getting any better.
I know that feeding the reported Spam and Ham is a manual process.
Has this been done on a a daily basis over the holiday period. If so how many training emails have been fed to the system?
I suspect that because a full roll-out of Postini is imminent they have abandoned training the current DSPAM filters - meaning that anyone reporting spam is wasting their time.
I know that feeding the reported Spam and Ham is a manual process.
Has this been done on a a daily basis over the holiday period. If so how many training emails have been fed to the system?
I suspect that because a full roll-out of Postini is imminent they have abandoned training the current DSPAM filters - meaning that anyone reporting spam is wasting their time.
In that case I would suggest that you let the staffing level drop too low!
Have you seen some of the posts about this? You could be losing users as a result - here's a sample from Usenet:
If you haven't realised, a lot of people have got very, very upset about the level of spams in the last two or three weeks. Knowing that the reason their efforts in forwarding missed spam hasn't been improving the perceived detection rate is because you haven't been doing any training is not going to improve matters.
Having Postini on the horizon is no answer for people who have faced 80-90% spam as compared to real emails all over the holiday.
You have dropped a spherical object on this - big time!
Have you seen some of the posts about this? You could be losing users as a result - here's a sample from Usenet:
Quote I can't believe that PlusNet is actually doing anything to stop the spam!
35 virtually identical items in my in-boxes this morning, since gone midnight last night, and presumably the same number in my wife's when she next uses her computer. (and one real message)
I would have thought it was in PlusNet's (and other ISPs) to stop it as it must be costing them a fortune.
Meanwhile my wife wants to know why I don't change my ISP "what if the (grand) children see it?"
Sorry, but its only the hassle involved which is stopping me changing at the moment - but if changing becomes less than the hassle of the spam, then I'm off
If you haven't realised, a lot of people have got very, very upset about the level of spams in the last two or three weeks. Knowing that the reason their efforts in forwarding missed spam hasn't been improving the perceived detection rate is because you haven't been doing any training is not going to improve matters.
Having Postini on the horizon is no answer for people who have faced 80-90% spam as compared to real emails all over the holiday.
You have dropped a spherical object on this - big time!
Quote from: pwebb
Quote from: jelv In that case I would suggest that you let the staffing level drop too low!
It was last trained the day before Christmas. It was not done on Thursday and Friday last week and was being done today, so it's only not been done on 2 working days.
Could you inform the spammers that they should not send out spam on weekends and bank holidays please!
We were told some time back that training the spam filters was a daily activity - with no suggestion that it was weekdays only. As spammers operate 24x7, and you process mail 24x7 training the spam filters should be a daily task.
Quote from: pwebb
Quote from: jelv If you haven't realised, a lot of people have got very, very upset about the level of spams in the last two or three weeks.
It was last trained 7 days ago, so I'm not sure why there would have been anything other than the usual seasonal increase that has caused the issue. This is also one of the main reasons that we have gone for a commercial offering as it will be far better than our own dspam solution.
The spammers have changed tack slightly many now have multiple words run together in both the subject and body; as you haven't been training the filter the vast majority of this has been getting through.
Quote from: pwebb
Quote from: jelv Having Postini on the horizon is no answer for people who have faced 80-90% spam as compared to real emails all over the holiday.
You have dropped a spherical object on this - big time!
I'm not sure why Postini is relevant to this conversation as we have not done anything different with our spam systems than we usually would?
Bob would normally be keeping an eye on issues like increasing levels of spam getting through. It's obvious that he has been spending time on Postini. There were many indications that for people not on the Postini trial it was starting to go pear shaped the week before Xmas - there has been a total lack of action on a developing situation.
I would also point out that as the [-SPAM-] tagging for Postini trialists is still DSPAM, many of those will have a very jaundiced view of Postini because they are seeing far, far more spam getting through untagged than they were before they were moved on to the trial - I've seen a number of posts saying just that.
Quote from: elton I bounce it all back using MailWasher
Bouncing is the worst feature of MailWasher - 99% of spam has faked sender addresses. All you are doing is sending it back to some poor unfortunate who had nothing to do with it in the first place.
Quote from: Oldjim The Postini trial appears to have very little effect on the amount of Spam received except for cutting out the direct MX route and this won't change until PlusNet use the Postini report to put the spam into the spam folder like DSPAM does.
Jim, have you seen a doubling or more of the volume of spam received since you sent on the trial? That is the amount of increase MikeB is reporting here and many, many others also not on Postini are reporting dramatic increases. If you are not seeing that sort of increase just imagine how many spams you would be getting if you were not on Postini!