Ripco's anti-spam filter

We have added a new, easy-to-use email filter for all paying customers.

To enable UCE (Unsolicted Commercial mail) filtering:

• From the User Menu, choose 'm'ail, then press '1' for 'Spam filter'.
• From the Unix shell prompt, type 'spam' and press ENTER.

After viewing some information on the features and hazards of mail filters, you will be prompted to choose a filter level. Most users should enter 'minimum' to choose the safest filter level.

WHAT SETTING SHOULD I CHOOSE?

Most users will want to choose the 'miminum' filter setting. This filter currently catches 90% of spam- nine out of ten spam mail messages will be placed in a folder Mail/rejected (under your home directory).
The 'minimal' level only catches material that it is 100% sure is SPAM, this means that it shouldn't reject any good mail, but will sometimes accept bad mail.

WILL I LOSE ANY MAIL?

The 'minimum' setting is highly unlikely to reject any valid (non-spam) email, however you should still check the Mail/rejected folder every once in a while, and delete the contents to conserve disk space. To check the 'rejected' folder from the shell prompt:

• With ELM: elm -f=rejected
• With PINE: pine -f rejected
• With MUSH: mush -f Mail/rejected

HOW DOES THE FILTER WORK?

The mail server filters the messages as them come in, but before they are actually placed in your system mailbox. The filters will work even if you read your mail with a POPmail client (Netscape, Eudora, Microsoft, etc).

WILL THIS STOP ALL THE SPAM?

There will always be some UCE that slips through the filters, if you'd like to help us tighten them, please send a copy of any spam you receive WITH ALL HEADERS INTACT, to 'stopspam@ripco.com'.
Sending us sample spams without 100% COMPLETE HEADERS is worse than useless.