MailSafi Glossary of Terms

Spam Filtering

Spam filtering is the process of blocking spam from a user’s inbox. Spam filters detect unwanted, unsolicited and potentially virus-infested email (called spam) and stop it from getting into users’ inboxes.

Because a large number of global email messages are spam, spam filtering is an essential service, more so in business communication today. It increases user and employee efficiency by sparing them the manual task of sifting through email messages to identify legitimate ones or to delete email spam. Internet Service Providers (ISPs) use spam filters to make sure they aren’t distributing spam. Businesses of all sizes also use spam filters to protect their employees and networks.

Spam filters can be applied on both inbound (email entering the network) and outbound (email leaving the network) messages.

However, it is important to note that even the best spam filters cannot block 100% of spam messages.

In the unfortunate event that legitimate emails are classified as spam by spam filters (false positives), they will end up in the spam or junk mail folders in a user’s mailbox. This explains why many support desks will ask you to check your spam or junk mail folder to confirm if your missing email(s) may have accidentally landed here.

Some service providers quarantine spam messages, rather than deleting them. This gives the users’ an opportunity to search through these quarantine databases to identify any emails that may have accidentally ended up here. You may mark them as ‘not spam’ so that they do not end up here in future. The same goes for the spam and junk mail folders. If you move an email from these folders to the primary inbox, in most cases, they will not be marked as spam in future.

Read more about why spam filtering is important for businesses and also why you should consider outsourcing your spam filtering services.