How Spam Filtering Works
Spam Filtering is not 100% accurate. It may not block all spam messages and it may filter legitimate messages marking them as spam.
The Internet e-mail message consists of five major components:
- Message header – information about how the e-mail was delivered
- From: header – party who sent the e-mail
- To: header – party to whom the e-mail is addressed
- Subject: header – what the e-mail is about
- Message body – the e-mail message itself
When an e-mail message arrives, these five major components are scanned and tested to see if they contain information that may indicate it is spam. If information in the e-mail indicates it may potentially be spam, a score is generated for the message. If this score exceeds a spam-score threshold, that e-mail message will be flagged as spam.
Once an e-mail is flagged as containing spam, the original e-mail will be attached to a notification e-mail and sent to the person to whom the e-mail was addressed. The subject of the notification e-mail will contain this message: *****SPAM*****<original e-mail message subject>.
The campus spam filter will not delete e-mail. It will simply mark it as possible spam and leave it to the user to make the final determination. PLNU will block known spam sites; however, the spam filter will ‘quarantine’ suspected spam and notify you that you have spam e-mail. Quarantined e-mail will be kept for about two weeks.
- This will keep the junk mail out of your Inbox and will not count against your e-mail storage.
- A spam notification message allows you to see the sender and the subject of a message.
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