Spam email has rapidly become a critical problem for all email service providers, both public and private. Boston College ITS has implemented new policies and technologies to protect the BC email system.

What BC is doing to fight spam

• BC Spam Quarantine Service: Information Technology Services uses a powerfull spam blocking service that quarantines messages it identifies as spam. Items are held in the BC Spam Quarantine Service and NOT delivered to email accounts. Quarantined messages are subject to automatic deletion based on the message's spam score.
  
  
• Spam Blocking Service Spamhaus: BC subscribes to Spamhaus, a spam blocking service that blocks email messages from confirmed spam sources. This service allows the BC email system to reject mail from known spammers on the blacklist, which is maintained in real time. Learn about Spamhaus spam blocking service.
  
  
• BC email users are required to enter their password to send email. This prevents computer viruses from sending large amounts of spam email from affected computers automatically, without the knowledge of the user.
  
  
• BC ITS is investigating ways to prevent spammers from collecting BC email addresses.
  
  
• As spammers discover new methods to circumvent many standard spam filters, BC continuously evaluates new technologies to leverage against spam.

Email Traffic and Spam home