Spam Filtering in Outlook 2000 - Advanced

This document is designed to assist ECE affiliates in setting up mail filters to decrease the amount of "junk mail" (also known as "spam") viewed in their Inbox. This "Advanced" form of spam filtering allows you to specify the spam score that is used to filter and allows you to create rules to prevent specific e-mail messages from being tagged as "spam."

Part 1: Adjusting the spam tolerance level

UCSD's spam filtering system uses an algorithm to determine the likelihood that a given piece of mail is "spam," based on a variety of criteria. It assigns each message a score, representing the probability that the message in question is spam. UCSD's system will tag a message as "spam" if it receives a score of 5.0 or above. You may wish to select a score other than five for your filtering needs. The score is represented in the mail message graphically in the X-Spam-Level header -- the number of asterisks (*) in the line denote the " spam score." Choosing a lower value will result in a greater volume of spam being directed to your Spam folder, but it will also increase the likelihood of a legitimate mail message accidentally being sorted as spam. To determine the level at which you feel comfortable filtering, we recommend that you examine the assigned score on a variety of messages in your inbox. To view this information you will need to look in the mail headers of your e-mail, which you can do by right-clicking on a message in your inbox and selecting "Options". Scroll through the section labeled "Internet Headers" - the spam score usually appears near the bottom.

Select "Tools" and then click on "Rules Wizard" Click On "New" Click On "Next"

Check the box next to with specific words in the message header. Click on specific words in the lower portion of the window. In the Search Text window type X-Spam-Level: Level and the number of *'s equal to the number you decided upon in Part 1. This must be typed exactly and with a single space between the ':' and the '*'s'. Click OK, then Next to continue.

Check the box next to move it to the specified folder. Click on specified in the lower portion of the window.

Click on Inbox and then click on New...

Type Spam in the Name field. Click OK to continue. Note: If you would like to create an exception rule, skip the next two items and go to Part 2: Creating exceptions... Click Finish Click OK to close the Rules Wizard.

From now on, all incoming e-mail which appears to be "spam" will be automatically moved to the new folder you created. Note that it is possible that legitimate e-mail may be accidentally marked as spam, so it is recommended that you periodically check the contents of this folder to ensure that this has not occurred before deleting its contents.

Part 2: Creating exceptions to spam filtering for commonly received mail

In order to further ensure that no mail gets accidentally marked as spam, you may want to add certain exceptions to your mail filtering rules, such as specifying certain e-mail addresses which should never be filtered out. To do this, after specifying the Spam folder, instead of clicking Finish click Next. You will be presented with a list of possible exceptions. In this example, we will be configuring Outlook to not filter mail sent from the address gbluefin@hotmail.com

Check the box next to except with specific words in the sender's address. Click on specific words in the lower portion of the window. Type the address of the person whose mail you do not want to be filtered and click OK. Click Finish.

From now on, all incoming e-mail which appears to be "spam" will be automatically moved to the new folder you created. Note that it is possible for legitimate e-mail to be accidentally marked as spam. It is recommended that you periodically check the contents of this folder to ensure that this has not occurred before deleting its contents.

Questions

If you have any further questions or encounter problems while attempting to set up your spam filtering, send an e-mail message to ecehelp@ece.ucsd.edu.