In response to faculty, staff and administrative requests, the SMCCCD ITS department has implemented a spam filter which quarantines spam email as it comes into the district's server.

After reading the information on this page, if you do not wish to have your email filtered, click on the link at the bottom of this page. You'll be redirected to a form you can fill-in and submit which will prevent your email from being filtered for spam.

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Background

The District has purchased an anti-spam filter called PureMessage. The goal of the spam filter is to reduce the number of questionable and objectionable emails received by SMCCCD staff.

The filter works at the server, rather than the desktop level. That means it works the same way for everybody and that all the configuration has already been done!

How It Works

When email is received, it goes through the PureMessage spam server on our network, which looks at the mail electronically. The filter looks for spam by scanning for key words and known spam site addresses. Mail that looks okay is sent through to the end user.  Email that looks like spam is quarantined, and the user is notified.

The PureMessage spam filtering system maintains your email privacy. No email content is read by any person at any time. PureMessage simply rates email by percentages. For instance, it might identify an email message as having a 98% possibility of being spam, or, conversely, a legitimate email might only have a 1% change of being spam. The administrator of the server sets the filter at a certain percentage. Right now, it filters items with a 50% or better chance of being spam. The filter level is set high enough to catch the majority of spam emails, but set low enough to accommodate differing opinions of what is and is not spam.

What a Staff Member Sees

The user receives an email, called a 'digest', from  PureMessage Admin (postmaster@smccd.net) spam server a few times a day.

The digest includes several components:

1. The beginning of the message explains why the user is receiving the email. It also includes instructions on retrieving a quarantined message from the PureMessage server.

2. There are four columns which describe the various components of the quarantined messages. Below is an explanation of each column:

ID: Each quarantined email has a "key" associated with it. If a user would like to retrieve the quarantined email, the server looks at the key, then releases the email to the user.

Time: Time the email was received by the server.

Score: The server rates each email, with a percentage of probability that it is spam. The higher the number, the higher the probability that the email is spam. In the example below the percentages range from 54% to 99%.  The filter uses known spam words and spam site email addresses. The server software is updated regularly to reflect the changing nature of spam.

From: The sender of the email

Subject: The subject line of the email

Reclaiming a Quarantined Message

Users can retrieve messages which have been quarantined. The beginning of the quarantined message explains the steps a user should follow for retrieving a message from the server.

1)  "Reply" to this message

2)  In the Body of the message, Highlight and Delete all lines except the ones containing the entry(s) for message(s) you wish to retrieve.

3)  When the only lines left in the message body are the ones containing the entries for the messages you wish to retrieve, "Send" it.

In the example below, the only message line included in the "reply" is the message the user would like to retrieve.

Once the message is sent, the user will receive the quarantined message within a few minutes.

Deleting Quarantined Messages

When reviewing the quarantined list, if there are no messages you would like to retrieve, simply delete the email from your inbox. No further action is needed.

I Don't Want PureMessage to Filter My Email

Click here if you don't want PureMessage to filter your email.

I've Changee My Mind!  Reactivate PureMessage

Email the helpdesk requesting the filter reactivated:  helpdesk@smccd.net