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

• Spam Control Service: By examining key characteristics of incoming messages, the BC Spam Control Service can identify many emails as spam and filter them into Junk folders. The BC Spam Control Service is available for all BC users. Learn how to turn on BC's Spam Control service in WebMail.
  • Spam filtering is automatically turned on for all users who forward their BC email to another account. This will ensure that more than 95% of our email users are filtering spam, and should help stop delayed and blocked email caused when BC email is blacklisted by domains like Yahoo, Gmail, and MSN.
    
    
• 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