Spam Technology Definitions
The following definitions will help you understand the technology ITS
is using to block or tag spam messages:
IronPort
New e-mail anti-spam and antivirus appliance that ITS is implementing on September 9. It will be used to block and tag spam messages. For more about IronPort visit www.ironport.com.
Barracuda
E-mail anti-spam and antivirus appliances being used to block and
tag spam messages. For more about Barracuda visit www.barracudanetworks.com.
Spamhaus block lists
Spamhaus is an organization that tracks the Internet's Spammers, and
spamming services and provides dependable realtime anti-spam protection
for Internet networks. The Barracudas utilize "The Spamhaus Block
List (SBL) which is a realtime database of IP addresses of spam-sources,
including known spammers, spam gangs, spam operations and spam support
services." "The database is kept updated every day, around
the clock, by Spamhaus Project team members around the world."
The Barracuda's also use the Spamhaus XBL which are special traps and
methods used to identify and analyze compromised or virus infected systems.
Bayesian analysis
This systems applies probabilistic analysis of individual words in
a message to come up with the probability of the whole message to be
either spam or not spam. This system can be "trained" over
time to recognize what is and it is not spam. This is done by marking
messages are spam/not spam which over time develops a database that
can be used as the basis of the probability analysis.
Spam fingerprinting
From the Barracuda Networks website "The Barracuda Spam Fingerprint
technology examines the characteristics, or fingerprint, of messages
previously identified as spam and uses this information to identify
the same or similar messages each time they are intercepted by the
Barracuda Spam Firewall. These real time fingerprint checks are continuously
updated and provide a method of identifying spam with nearly zero false
positives."
Proprietary intent filtering
Barracuda Intention Analysis attempts to match URLs in a message against
a database of URLs known for sending spam.
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