Spam is unsolicited, bulk email--also known as "junk" email. Spam is an unfortunate by-product of the success of the Internet. Not simply an irritation to email users, spam can also cause a system outage by overloading email servers, preventing non-spam email from getting through.
The BC email system services over 76,000 users. There are approximately 26,000 students, faculty, and staff accounts, and 50,000 forwarding accounts. In the past year, email traffic has increased exponentially.
May 2006:
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Eight months later (February 2007):
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This increase has put pressure on our systems in the following ways:
The following articles help us to appreciate our own fight against spam in a broader context:
Spam
Made Up 94% Of All E-Mail In December Information Week E-mail
users want more control of inboxes: survey Boston.com Criminals
flock to the Internet, survey finds Boston.com Spam
Epidemic Hits U.S. Businesses Hard TMCnet on the Web Two
of every three office e-mails are spam Sacramento Business Journal Study:
Spam costs companies $70B annually Boston Business Journal Spam
costs US$712 per employee annually IT News
