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Why
do I receive so much unsolicited email (JUNK/SPAM), and what can be done to reduce it?
The Basics
Unsolicited
email, commonly referred to as "SPAM", is a large and constantly
evolving issue. "Spammers", the source of the problem, use
a variety of methods to gather email addresses including using programs to
spider through web pages, searching for them in the html tags ("mailto:email@mydomain.com").
Nonetheless, an address that has been "publicly available" for a
longer period of time and/or in more locations, would typically have more
"SPAM".
Solutions
A variety of
efforts are constantly being made by a variety of parties, to
combat spam. For example, individuals build their own set of filters
in their email program, and the government has begun adapting new
laws to combat "SPAM". The only problem with
preventing all "SPAM" is how to rid of all that you do not wish
to receive, without filtering what you do. Complicated formulas
including "spam scores", and whitelist/blacklists have been
adapted to "solve" the issue.
Pebblehaven is
constantly adding new and often sophisticated methods to assist you in
reducing the amount of "SPAM" you receive. Here are the
most typical methods our customers utilize.
- Enable advanced
spam filtering on your account. If your account is not setup with
spam filtering capabilities already, please email support@pebblehaven.com
and request that it be enabled. Spam filtering for the most part
combines a whitelist/blacklist capability, while also using complicated
formulas to score an email based upon its content. Emails which
either match requirements setup in the blacklist, or those which receive a
score above the amount setup for your account, are either deleted or moved
to a separate folder (depending upon your setup preferences). If
stored, these emails can be accessed via your web based email, or by using
an email client that supports IMAP
- Purchasing a third
party software, which once installed will filter the email directly on
your computer, rather than on the server.
- Setup
one email account for use on your web site, mailing lists and other
vulnerable mediums. Then, setup another one for more frequent use,
to communicate with customers and others regarding more time sensitive
information.
- Disable the
"catch-all" feature on your email account.
Some more drastic
approaches are sometimes undertaken, and instantly reap benefits.
- A change of
email address. When choosing this option, many customers also
temporarily enable an autoresponse message on their old email address,
which informs customers of the address switch (to update their records,
and to resubmit their email to the correct address). It is very
likely that any program sending the "SPAM" will not be reading
the replies on an invididual basis or even receiving them at all (Because
they send to such a large number of addresses, and since their
"from" email address is typically masked and therefore not a
function email address, they tend to get a lot of undeliverable messages,
failure notices, etc).
Read
a message from the Federal Trade Commission regarding
"SPAM".
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How
can I view emails that have been filtered, or marked as SPAM?
Simply
login to your web based email, and click on the
"Spam" directory. For most users, the "Spam"
directory will be listed under "Folders".
Please
note: You may have to subscribe to this folder before being able to view
the contents. To do so, simply click on "Folders" and then click
on the name of the folder you wish to subscribe to, and click
"Subscribe".
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Multiple copies of the same email(s) are
downloading into my email client (Outlook, Outlook Express, etc). What can be done about this?
My connection is timing out or failing before finishing the send/receive operation.
There are several possible "solutions". We recommend going in order in
troubleshooting. Meaning, the most common solution is at the top and the
least likely/most drastic is at the bottom.
1) A large email, email(s) of certain characteristics, or a large number of emails, may be "blocking" your email client from processing a complete send/receive. For example, if you have a 20mb file or if you have 400 emails
waiting to download to your email client, from the server. Your email client may fail or "cancel" before finishing its send/receive operation.
Then, the next time you check for mail, it will try to download all messages on the server.
In plain words, it may not have had the chance
to tell the server which emails it previously downloaded, as this is typically done at the end of the
send/receive operation. First,
close your email client. Then, log into your web based email
account and delete email messages which you have already downloaded to your email client and/or do not wish to receive.
Then, reopen your email client and resume normal activity.
2) You will need to download service packs for your Office version from the
Office Download
center
You will see in the center of the screen two pull down menus. One will be entitled Product: and the other Version:. Leave the Product Category on Office and change the Version to whichever Office package you have. (It should tell you that when you open up a program within the Suite. It should say something like Word 2000 if it is 2000 or Word 2002/xp if it is XP). Select your version and a list of downloads will appear below. (You may need to click the button labeled Update to refresh the list.) Locate the downloads that say Service Pack X (X being the number of the Service pack) and download those. Don't worry about ones that have Service Pack X and then something after it like (SP-2) for MultiLanguage support etc. Just download the ones that say Service Pack X.
3) If this problem has to do with Outlook Express, we have been informed to try the following: Outlook Express uses a file to keep track of which message have been downloaded so that it can download only new messages. Sometimes this file becomes corrupted which results in the same messages getting downloaded again. You need to locate the file pop3uidl.dbx and rename it. Start Outlook Express and check for new mail
4) If none of the above solutions were able to assist, and you need further technical support, please contact
support@pebblehaven.com
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Why is my email being returned, or not received, when I send to a particular email address?
Typically, a message is returned because of something related to the email hosting of the recipient (the person you were sending the email to). For example,
there may be a spam filter which has marked your message as spam, or the user is temporarily over their user quota.
You can usually and easily determine the cause by reviewing the returned message. If you are unable to figure out why it is returning and would like
further assistance, please forward a copy of the returned message to support@pebblehaven.com
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I am continually receiving emails containing
viruses. What can be done?
I received an unusual email, and suspect it contains a virus. Does
it? Pebblehaven
advises all users to have some sort of anti-virus software that is
continually updated. Symantec (www.symantec.com),
makers of Norton Anti-Virus software, is the most widely used in the
industry. With such software installed, emails containing virus
should automatically be detected and deleted. Their web site also
contains up-to-date information on the viruses, and also often includes
removal tools. Unfortunately,
our support team will not be able to provide information on viruses
(whether an email contains one, or not). Thus, the best way to
answer this question is with the anti-virus software (which can
automatically detect this for you). Also, you can consult Symantec's
web site, where it is often easy to search for viruses which relate to the
message you received (For example, you could search for the file name
attached to the email, or the subject line of the email). Emails
containing viruses do not always originate from email addresses you are
familiar with, and can be considered spam. Thus, if you are interested in
filtering options available, please see above. In
response to a customer interest, we have partnered with an organization to
provide server based anti-virus detection. This service scans
incoming and outgoing mail for viruses and is available with any web
hosting package, for up to 10 email users, at an additional $15 per
month. If you are interested in adding this option to your account(s),
please contact us.
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I received a "returned email", "bounce-back message" from an email that I did not send,
although appears to have come from my email address, or an email address at my domain name. Why does this happen and what can I do?
I received an email from a user at my domain name, however I do not know of such a user.
Typically, this is unsolicited email or most specifically SPAM. More often than not, it is
a case of a forged email header where the senders email address (yours) is forged. This is not
uncommon and is rather easy to accomplish.
For example, one could just modify the from address in their Outlook settings to be bill@microsoft.com and leave all other fields the same. If a message is sent, it will appear to be from bill@microsoft.com. However, it is typically done on a more automated/program level, and on a larger scale (using your email and that of many others).
These types of messages are also commonly used to spread viruses. You may receive an email
that appears to be a notification that you sent a virus to a particular party. However, the message stating you sent a virus is actually the virus itself, or a forged sender actually sent the virus (again this is an example and does not cover every case).
Our
primary recommendation would be to simply delete the email. If the problem
persists, you might want to adjust your spam filtering settings
to "blacklist" a particular email address(es) where they are
frequently sent from (such as nonuser@yourdomain.com), or to lower the
"score" set for your spam control. If the problem persists,
please notify our support team,
by forwarding a copy of the email to them.
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How
can I have an autoresponse/away message automatically sent to any emails
which are sent to my email address during a given time? Simply
login to your control
panel! On some accounts, you will click on "Users" and
then the "Mail" link to the right of your email address to enter
your message. On others, you will click on "Autoresponse"
immediately after login.
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I
would like to delete all the mail in my inbox, what is the best way to go about
this? There
are two primary methods: 1)
Quickly delete the email account, and then add it back again via your control
panel. This will truly "refresh" things. 2)
Login to your web based email, select all the messages (typically by clicking on
"Toggle All" or "Select All"), and then delete (typically by
clicking "Delete" or move to "Trash").
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