Using spam filters in Lotus Notes
Unsolicited "junk" e-mail sent to large numbers of people to
promote products or services. Sounds simple enough, but even for
humans it can be tough to decide which messages are spam and which
are legitimate email. One persons spam is another's legitimate
message. For that reason our spam filtering system is entirely
voluntary. If you do not enable spam filtering in your Notes
client, then you will continue to receive all the mail that is
addressed to you.
To determine if messages are spam they are scored with a "spam
level" as they enter our mail system from the outside world. The
score is based on the message having attributes that are common to
spam messages or a sender address that has produced spam in the
past. Though this system is fairly effective, it is only guessing
as to the nature of the message. Spam messages will occasionally
get through and legitimate e-mail will be incorrectly identified as
spam. For this reason messages that score high enough to be
considered spam are moved to a "-SPAM-" folder so you can be the
final judge. It is important that you check your "-SPAM-" folder
at least weekly to see that no legitimate mail has been directed
there.
Standard - The Standard filter is configured to minimize the
amount of legitimate mail that is incorrectly identified as
spam. It still manages to catch most spam email. It is recommended
you start with this setting and only change to the Aggressive
filter if this one is not working for you.
Aggressive - The Aggressive filter is configured to maximize the
amount of spam that is identified correctly and so will also
misidentify more legitimate messages as spam. Only use this option
if the Standard filter not filtering out enough spam from your
Inbox.
Enabling and disabling the filters in notes is quite easy, and
once enabled only requires you to periodically check your "-SPAM-"
folder as mentioned above. A new menu item "Spam" has be added to
the "Actions" menu in the Notes client. Though it is always
visible, the "Spam" menu will only work correctly when you are
viewing your mail, rather than your calendar for instance. If you
use the "Spam" menu in the calendar or other views, you will
receive an "Action Failed" message. The "Spam" menu has the
following options:
- Disable All Filters - Completely turn off spam filtering
- Enable Aggressive Filter - Create -SPAM- folder and start
filtering messages there.
- Enable Standard Filter - Create -SPAM- folder and start
filtering messages there.
- Help - Takes you to this web page
To start filtering just select "Enable Standard Filter", a -SPAM-
folder will be created and you will receive a message confirming
that the filter has been enabled.
If you don't see the -SPAM- folder in your list of folders,
restart the notes client. If you decide to change the filter you
are using select "Disable All Filters" before selecting the new
filter or you will receive an error.
Messages in your -SPAM- folder which are more than 30 days old
will be deleted. It is important that you review the messages in
the -SPAM- folder or you will lose legitimate email that you
have put there.
The rules feature of Notes allows you to fine tune how your spam
filters work. You can add new criteria for moving mail messages to
the "- SPAM -" folder to handle spam that is getting through to
your "Inbox". If the spam filter is moving messages to the "-SPAM-"
folder that are not spam, you can override this by creating a rule
to move messages meeting a particular criteria to your "Inbox" (see
graphic below).
There is additional information on using
rules in notes help.