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Protecting Mailboxes From Spam
To protect your mailbox from undesirable correspondence, do not publish your e-mail address on Internet forums and switch on the server-side spam filter provided by the SpamAssassin software.
Setting Up SpamAssassin Spam Filter
If you receive undesirable correspondence to an e-mail address that you cannot or do not want to remove, consider setting up spam filter for your mailbox. To do this,
- Enable SpamAssassin spam filter in Parallels Plesk Panel if he is disabled and
- Install spam filtering software of your choice to work with e-mail program on your home or office computer.
Switching on Spam Filter
To switch on spam filtering for a mailbox:
| 1. |
Go to Home (Screen 1) > Mail (Screen 2)> e-mail address > Spam Filter.
Screen 1
Screen 2
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| 2. |
Configure the following settings:
Screen 3
- Switch on SpamAssassin spam filtering. Select this option to switch on spam protection if spam filter is disabled. (Button 1 on the screen 3)
- The score that a message must receive to qualify as spam. This setting adjusts spam filter sensitivity. SpamAssassin performs a number of different tests on contents and subject line of each message. As a result, each message scores a number of points. The higher the number, the more likely a message is spam. For example, a message containing the text string "BUY VIAGRA AT LOW PRICE!!!" in Subject line and message body scores 8.3 points. By default, the filter sensitivity is set so that all messages that score 7 or more points are classified as spam. (Box 2 on the screen 3)
- If you receive lots of spam messages with the current setting, to make filter more sensitive, try setting a lesser value in the The score that a message must receive to qualify as spam box; for example, 6.
- If you are missing your e-mails because your spam filter thinks they are junk, try reducing filter sensitivity by setting a higher value in the The score that a message must receive to qualify as spam box.
Note: To further improve spam filter accuracy, you may want to train your spam filter on e-mail messages you receive.
- What to do with spam mail. If you are sure that your spam filter is accurate, you may want to set the filter to automatically delete all incoming messages recognized as spam. To do this, select the Delete option (Button 3 on the screen 3). If you wish to filter mail with the software on your local computer, select the Mark as spam and store in mailbox option, and then specify how spam filter should mark the messages recognized as spam. "X-Spam-Flag: YES" and "X-Spam-Status: Yes" headers are added to the message source by default, and if you want, the spam filter will also include a specific text string to the beginning of Subject line. To include a desired combination of symbols or words to the message subject, type it into the Add the following text to the beginning of subject of each message recognized as spam Box (Box 4 on the screen 3). If you do not want the spam filter to modify message subject, leave this box blank. If you want to include into the subject line the number of points that messages score, type _SCORE_ in this box.
- Spam detection alert text. If you want spam filter to include a text into e-mail messages marked as spam, type the text into this box.
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| 3. |
Click OK to save the settings. |
| 4. |
If you do not want to receive e-mail from specific domains or individual senders, click the Black List tab (Tab 5 on the screen 3), and then add the respective entries to the spam filter's black list:
- To add entries to the black list, click Add Addresses. If you have a list of entries stored in a file, click Browse to specify it, and then click OK. Otherwise, select the From List option, and type the e-mail addresses into the E-mail addresses box. Place each address in one row, or separate addresses with a coma, a colon, or a white space. You can use an asterisk (*) as a substitute for a number of letters, and question mark (?) as a substitute for a single letter. For example: address@spammers.net, user?@spammers.net, *@spammers.net. Specifying *@spammers.net will block the entire mail domain spammers.net. To save the entries you added, click OK, then confirm adding, and click OK again.
- To remove entries from the black list, under the Black List tab, select the entries and click Remove. Confirm removal and click OK.
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| 5. |
If you want to be sure that you will not miss e-mail from specific senders, click the White List tab (Tab 6 on the screen 3), and then add e-mail addresses or entire domains to the spam filter's white list:
- To add entries to the white list, click Add Addresses. If you have a list of entries stored in a file, click Browse to specify it, and then click OK. Otherwise, select the From List option, and type the e-mail addresses into the E-mail addresses box. Place each address in one row, or separate addresses with a coma, a colon, or a white space. You can use an asterisk (*) as a substitute for a number of letters, and question mark (?) as a substitute for a single letter. For example: address@mycompany.com, user?@mycompany.com, *@mycompany.com. Specifying *@mycompany.com will add to the white list all e-mail addresses that are under the mycompany.com mail domain. To save the entries you added, click OK, then confirm adding, and click OK again.
- To remove entries from the white list, under the White List tab, select the entries and click Remove. Confirm removal and click OK.
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| 6. |
Once finished with setting up the spam filter, click OK. |
Improving Accuracy of Spam Detection
You can improve accuracy of spam detection by training the spam filter on the e-mail messages that you have in your mailbox.
To improve accuracy of spam detection:
1. Go to Home > Mail > e-mail address > Spam Filter > Training (Tab 6 on the screen 3).
| Note: In Parallels Plesk Panel for Linux/Unix platforms, each message is accompanied by an icon in the left |
| column, which tells if a message is recognized as spam - |
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, non-spam - |
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, or not recognized at all |
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If you have already trained your spam filter on a message and the results were recorded in the spam filter's database, an icon  is shown in the right column.
2. Train the spam filter. In most cases, you can tell if a message is spam by looking at its subject line and sender's name. If they do not give you any clue, try looking inside the message using your e-mail program or Webmail interface.
- To mark a message as spam, select the corresponding check box and click 'It's Spam!'.
- To mark a message as not spam, select the corresponding check box and click 'It's Not Spam'.
- To remove any information on a given message from the spam filter database, select the corresponding check box and click 'Forget It'.
3. Once finished with training, you can remove spam e-mails from your mailbox using your e-mail program or Webmail interface.
Clearing Spam Filter's Database
If you have accidentally made your spam filter learn a great number of spam e-mails as non-spam or vice versa, your spam filter will likely produce incorrect results. In this case, clear the spam filter's database and then repeat training.
To clear spam filter's database:
1. Go to Home > Mail > e-mail address > Spam Filter >Training tab.
2. Click the Clear button.
Switching off Spam Filter
To switch off spam filtering for a mailbox:
| 1.Go to Home > Mail > e-mail address > Spam Filter. |
| 2. Click Switch Off |
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