Amazing amount of SPAM getting through

[Julian Field]

The short answer to all this is "Yes, you really do want to use the latest
version of SpamAssassin". Don't install it from their RPM, download the
.tar.gz and build it by hand. It's only a few commands....

         tar xzf Mail-SpamAssassin-2.55.tar.gz
         cd Mail-SpamAssassin-2.55
         perl Makefile.PL
         make
         make test
         make install
then set "Use SpamAssassin = yes" in your MailScanner.conf and restart
MailScanner.

Simple as that.

At 13:06 20/08/2003, you wrote:
>Last night I set our MailScanner machine to handle 100% of our e-mail
>traffic.  It immediately began sifting through our e-mails.  I was surprised
>by three things:
>
>1).  We get much more e-mail than I expected - about 600 a day from the
>looks of it.
>2).  That Sobig.F is moving so quickly - MailScanner caught 44 different
>e-mails with it yesterday evening. (YAY MailScanner!)
>3).  Out of the 600 or so e-mails, only 10 or so have been flagged as
>"Spam".
>
>I can confirm No. 3 with a simple example - my mailbox.  When I arrived this
>morning, I had 10 e-mails waiting on me.  Of those 10, 9 were SPAM.
>MailScanner had only flagged (modified the Subject line with "{Spam}") 2 of
>them.  If this dispersal is "typical" (which I doubt) that means that
>approximately 78% of the SPAM we get is getting through MailScanner.
>
>Don't get me wrong, I'm happy to be able to handle the 22% we are getting,
>but this is nothing like the 95% claim that I've seen touted about.
>
>I truly believe this is because of my configuration.  I'm using the stock
>DNSBLs and rulesets that come with MailScanner 4.22-5.  I have been to
>http://www.declude.com/JunkMail/Support/ip4r.htm and looked at additional
>DNSBLs to add, but not sure which of those would be the best.  Any
>suggestions?
>
>Another question I have concerns SpamAssassin (SA).  Would my SPAM detection
>rates go up if I include SA to the mix?  Do I need SA to get the 95% rate?
>
>--
>Kevin L. Collins, MCSE
>Systems Manager
>Nesbitt Engineering, Inc.

--
Julian Field
www.MailScanner.info
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