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Spam Scoring

Problem:

How do I make sure that Barracuda isn't accidentally deleting the email I do want?

Solution:

To teach Barracuda how to differentiate between good and bad email, it is suggested that you review your Quarantine Inbox on a daily basis at first. When you classify messages as "spam" or "not spam" in your Quarantine Inbox, you are teaching the Bayesian database about what kinds of messages you want delivered to your email inbox and what kind of messges you want blocked. "Spam Scoring" refers to the "score" that the Barracuda database assigns to each incoming message. A score of "0" means the database is certain the message is not spam, and a score of 10 the database is certain that the message is spam.

If you're concerned about whether or not important emails are accidentally being caught in Barracuda spam firewall, it's in your interest to take an active role in classifying the messages that end up in your quarantine box as "spam" or "not spam." You may also wish to change the settings for how Barracuda scores incoming messages and what it does with those messages. See below for instructions on how to change these settings and a more in-depth explanation of spam scoring.

The first thing to do is to make sure spam filtering is enabled, then you can change your spam scoring configuration.

To enable or disable spam filtering;

Spam Scoring - Enable / Disable
Use System Defaults Select YES to use the default scoring levels. Or,
Select NO to change the Spam Scoring Levels section as described below.
enable_spam_filter.jpg

 

How Spam is Scored:

The Barracuda Spam Firewall scans your email for spam content and scores it using several spam filtering methods .

The ISU default configuration is set to delete messages having a score 8 through 10. The score ranges from 0 (definitely not spam) to 10 (definitely spam) Based on the score, the Barracuda Spam Firewall will allow, quarantine or block the message.

When a message is sent to you, Barracuda handles it in the following order:

  1. If sender is on the Whitelist, Barracuda places the message in your inbox. (See exceptions in the Whitelist documentation section.)
  2. If sender is on the Blacklist, Barracuda deletes the message.
  3. The remaining email is given a score.
    1. Email receiving a score of 0 to 2.4 is placed in your regular email Inbox.
    2. Email receiving a score of 2.5 to 7.9 is placed in your Quarantine Inbox.
    3. Email receiving a score of 8 - 10 is blocked. No notice of blocked email is given to any party.
    4. Spam scoring is the rules based system (about 4000 rules) that looks for characteristics in the email. The Spam scores are used to determine what to do with the email.

 

Spam Scoring Levels
spam_scoring.jpg
Tag Score Possible values for the TAG score are: 0 through 10
0 = All messages not blocked are tagged with the word [BULK] added to the subject line.
10 = Turned off - No messages will have [BULK] on the subject line.
The ISU default setting is 10 (turned off).
If you want your messages to have the word [BULK] added to the subject line of mass mail, change the TAG number. You may use any number between 0 and 10.
Quarantine score Possible values for the QUARANTINE score are: 0 through 10 0 = All messages are that are not blocked are quarantined. All messages except those listed on your whitelist, will go to your Quarantine Inbox.

10 = Quarantine disabled. All email not blocked will go directly to your regular inbox. The ISU default setting is 3.0 This means that quarantine is enabled and anything that is under the block threshold (score 2.5 to 8) will go to quarantine unless you have added it to your Whitelist. To enable the quarantine feature, the quarantine setting must have a value lower than the block threshold.
Block Score Possible values for the BLOCK score are: 0 through 10
0 = All messages are blocked. Exception - Addresses on your Whitelist will be placed in your inbox.
10 = Disabled. No messages are blocked. You'll get everything sent to you.
The ISU default value is 8. The setting of 8 means that only the most obvious junk mail will be deleted. The rest will go to quarantine where you have the opportunity to review it and teach Barracuda how to handle future messages from that sender.

 

To learn about the methods used to determine if an email message is spam or not, please review the Spam Filtering Methods document.

If you'd like to review the Barracuda Networks support site documentation, please visit http://www.barracudanetworks.com/support/documentation.php

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Category: Email : Barracuda Online Now     Platform: Not Applicable
Document #: 890     Author: Cynthia Senicka    
Last Modified by: Cynthia Senicka on 05/08/2008