Optimal SA Configuration

What would be the optimal SA configuration for catching spam. It seems that with the default:

Your Current Policy: Default
Tag Level: 999
Quarantine Level: 4

It does do the job, but some spam still seeps through. What would be the best configuration? Is lower # the more aggressive the filter is? And how does tagging to quarantine level ratio works?

Thanks!

I would try 4 (tag) and 20 (quarantine)... 3 and 15 if you want to get a little more aggressive. Then configure your client to filter mail tagged as spam to a separate folder.

What about for server side filtering? If I don't want spam to get through to my mail client. With the current setting of 999/4, all of the spam is held in that junk folder. So would setting the quarantine level lower than the tag level, all of the spam will be delivered to that junk folder?

I got what you meant, sorry. Disregard my previous message. Thanks for your help. It all make sense now.

Oh yeah, and just to add my two cents, I think Will is being paranoid.

I dealt with a lot of beta testers getting this filer stuff up and running, and people much preferred the tighter default scores.

And remember, this filter aint perfect, but it's a whole lot better than no filter at all!

If you really, really, really need a perfect filter, you'll have to roll your own. It's not practically feasible for one filter to be able to handle everybody's wildly different definitions of unwanted email!


nate.

thanks for the heads up. I find that 4/5 works just about right. Getting an average of 95% success rate with that setting. Also, in reference to spam reports. Are they up and running? I have them set to default: weekdays. Haven't received one yet. Those reports functional or still being tested?

Gracias,
Aleks.

Note that the /999 for tag is irrelevant - if the quarantine is lower than the tag number, doesn't matter what the tag # is, because mail above the quarantine threshold is always quarantined and not tagged.

Perhaps Nate can comment more on the spam reports (though you might check and make sure they didn't make it to your junk folder too).

Side note - I fixed the configuration so now mail that would normally be rejected outright by our normal mail servers is being rejected by the junk mail filter machine as well.. so there should be somewhat of a drop in the amount of spam.

Yeah, I think spam reports are being filtered. I'll work on this more tonight and tomorrow. (Four of us, myself and Will included, are at a conference in Atlanta, so our schedules are a little wonky.)

And to clarify about tagging vs. quarantining: we're talking about subject line tagging. Mail is ALWAYS tagged with informative headers about scores and stuff. But if the quarantine level is below the tag level, you won't get extra crap stuck in the subject line of your mail. And I'm pretty sure nobody uses the subject line tagging stuff.


nate.