Fighting Spam!

The Office of Information Systems is aware of the increasing amount of spam email.  We want to assure all users that we are working hard to eliminate spam on our email servers.  Spam detection and elimination is not an exact science and takes some trial and error before striking the correct balance of rejecting actual spam messages and allowing legitimate emails.
Some of the actions that we are taking include the following: 

1. We have set up a new email address for collecting spam emails - spam@cnr.edu. Should you receive any spam email, please forward it to this email address so that we can analyze it and create rules based on the content. This will help improve spam detection and block future similar messages.
2. We will be using whitelisting, blacklisting and greylisting email features.  Whitelisting will automatically allow emails through from known/trusted senders.  Blacklisitng will automatically block emails for example, from known spammers. Greylisting will verify unknown senders upon their first email delivery attempt – a process which may delay email delivery for up to 4 hours – before either rejecting or delivering the message.
3. We are also working with a new spam vendor and looking to use their product to its full capabilities.

In the meantime, please continue to take the following precautions:

• Be suspicious of email messages that contain urgent requests for personal financial information, even if they appear to be from a trusted source.
• Do not click links in email messages that you suspect are not legitimate. Instead, open a new browser window and type in the URL directly.
• Do not disclose personal or financial data in email.
• Remember that we will never request that you submit personal or private information including your password over email. The Office of Information Systems will never send you email from a non-CNR email address.

We appreciate your patience and input as we work through this process.