How to setup Weberz anti-spam filters

Weberz’s Anti Spam set up allows a user to add spam filters to their mail resources as well as create custom configurations/rules for the spam filter.

To get started, login to your Control Panel. Don’t know how to login? Click here to find out. Since email is the topic of discussion, the focus of the rest of the article will be on that section. The control panel is split into sections, and each section contains links to any areas that are relevant to that section. Find the email section, and then click the email link within that section. This will open the email portion of the control panel.

When the email link is clicked, the mail manager will open. This manager is where all configurations, for all email accounts, for all domains are stored. This is also where Anti-Spam options can be configured.

There are two ways to implement the spam filters in the control panel. They can be implemented globally (meaning across all mailboxes) or on a per mailbox basis. To implement Anti-Spam globally, click the “preferences applied to all mailboxes” link, next to the Anti-Spam, icon under the Mail Service section. If the preferences are to be applied to a single mailbox, click the anti spam icon next to the mailbox. The icon has two envelope icons being crossed out by a red circle.

The Anti-Spam interface is the same across both selections, so the settings below apply to both global and local Anti-Spam settings. Please note that if an individual mailbox is being configured, any global rules that are applied to the mailboxes on that domain are automatically included and imported into the interface for the mailbox.

Once the Anti Spam page has loaded, a window similar to the one below will load. The available configuration options in this section are:

Spam Check Level
Spam Processing
White List
Black List

The white list is a listing of all domains/email addresses that are automatically allowed to send mail to the mailbox/domain without being processed by the spam filter. The black list is a listing of domain/email addresses that are automatically blocked by the spam filter. All other mail will be scanned and compared against a set of lists of known spammers. If a message matches one of the rules, it is processed as spam. If a message doesn’t match any of the rules, it’s allowed straight through to the mailbox.

To change the level of spam, change the Spam Check Level. A higher setting will result in more mail being blocked by the filter. Since no spam filter is perfect, this can cause legitimate email to become blocked. The white list fixes this problem. If legitimate email is being blocked simply add the address/domain to the white list to allow it to come through. It works the other way around too. If spam is still getting through, add the sender’s address/domain to the black list and any further email from that contact will be filtered as spam.

What happens to email filtered as spam? This depends on the Anti-Spam settings. There are a couple of options available. The email can be marked as spam and then forwarded on. This works for people who do not wish to miss an important email due to incorrect spam filtering. This also allows for filtering rules to be setup via the email program on the client’s end. The email can be removed. If this option is selected, the email will automatically be deleted if flagged as spam. The email can also be moved to another email address. If this is enabled, all messages marked as spam will be forwarded to the specified email address.

Once again, no spam filter is perfect. There will never be a filter that will catch all spam all the time. However, the filters are getting smarter. With a solid combination of filtering on the server side, combined with rules and filtering on the client side, spam can become a lot less of a hassle.