Networking All-in-One For Dummies

Chapter 5

Blocking Spam

In This Chapter

Understanding what spam is

Seeing how antispam filters can block spam

Options for setting up an antispam solution

Dealing with the spam that still gets through

Spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, and spam.

So goes the famous Monty Python sketch, in which a woman at a restaurant just wants to order something that doesn’t have spam in it.

That pretty much sums up the situations with most people’s inboxes these days. The legitimate email gets lost among the spam emails. Wouldn’t you like to look at an inbox that wasn’t filled with spam?

Nobody likes spam. You don’t like it, and your users don’t like it either. And believe me, they’ll let you know if they’re getting too much spam in their inboxes. They’ll hold you personally responsible for every email with an offensive subject line, every email that tries to sell them stuff they aren’t interested in, and every email that attempts to get them to provide their bank account password or credit card number.

As a network administrator, part of your job is protecting your users from spam. The holy grail ...