Comment Articles

Microsoft applies its might to fighting spam

David Coursey AnchorDesk

Published: 28 Oct 2003 15:10 GMT

Since last Monday's column about the spam filtering built into Outlook 2003, I've received email from readers questioning my numbers. So let me reiterate: Yes, Outlook really is keeping the vast majority of spam out of my inbox.

Over the past week, I've continued my (admittedly) unscientific testing. And during that week, Outlook successfully filtered 95 to 98 percent of the mail I received.

The worst Outlook did was the day I received a total of 361 messages. Of those, Outlook flagged 240 as spam. Of the 121 that made it through to my inbox, 18 were spam. Of the 240 that were dropped into the junk mail folder, I found no misfiles, nor have I heard from friends telling me I'm not responding to their email. So, of the 361 messages that Outlook processed that day, 18 (or about 5 percent) were processed incorrectly.

That's how I do the math.

Interestingly, most of those 18 messages contained no text in the body of the message -- just a subject line. So I guess Microsoft Outlook has trouble filtering spamless spam.

But filtering email is just one of the ways Microsoft's fighting spam. I recently spoke to Ryan Hamlin, Microsoft's supreme allied commander in the spam war, who said that war is being fought on five fronts. They are:

Technology. The filtering tools in Outlook are also being used on MSN. And Microsoft is working on anti-spam technology for Exchange and other server platforms.

Industry cooperation. Microsoft is working with other companies, including competitors like AOL, to coordinate efforts where it makes sense to do so.

Federal and legal. Microsoft is working in Washington and in international groups to regulate spam.

Enforcement. With a legal staff of 14, Hamlin has already gone after some spammers and promises to go after more.

Consumer education. This entails helping users understand how to avoid as much spam as possible and how they can support efforts to stop spammers before the hit the Send button.

Each of these areas could probably support a whole column, but I want to focus on the technology, which affects users most immediately.

Microsoft has recruited a crew of MSN users who've agreed to participate in a project that's providing the raw material for Microsoft's filter development program. Some 250,000 MSN members regularly receive emails from MS, asking them whether a given email message recently delivered to their account was or was not spam.