Living with Filters: The No Subject Problem
by Ross Lasley
There is no doubt about it – email is less reliable as a form of communication today than it was 18 months ago. Those of us who have been doing this forever remember the beginning of email – following up with phone calls to make sure the person got it, sending things again, and all sorts of other confirmation type mechanisms.
Soon these may be needed again. If you are like most, you've experienced lost or misplaced email – often for the first time in years – in the last year or so.
The problem we face is that business people are now forced to use filtering technology to combat the endless flow of junk invading our inboxes. Filters are getting pretty darn good, but the sheer volume of messages being processed leads to more and more problems – if your filter only makes an error one out of every 10,000 messages, that'd be six errors a week or so in my inbox. No doubt about it, the technology is getting much better, but the pace of junk mail growth is greater than the ability to reduce errors; that 1/10 of one percent error rate which would have been acceptable a year ago would result in many more errors today.
There are some things you should know to reduce the likelihood your messages get grabbed by mistake:
- Never send mail without a subject. This is a common indicator of junk.
- Watch your content. Specific words and phrases trigger filters, and here is a good list of them (note: There is no standard for this. Different systems use different tests.)
- Use your branded email address (you@yourname.com) for all communication. Your ISP address or your Yahoo! type address can be problematic.
- Avoid all CAPITALS. It triggers filters, is also known as SCREAMING, and is very obnoxious. (Geek rant on the topic here. Caution: this is not safe for work or for kids. This is the best ranting geek online, but he has a foul mouth and a bad attitude.)
There are ways to ensure your messages get through, as well. A return receipt is the most common mechanism, as well as those simple followups we all used to do.
The most important thing is to be aware that it's possible your message got caught either by the end user's filter or the ISP's filter. If this happens, your recipient never even knows it, as it will not appear in a junk mail report.
Do what you can to prevent it and know you are now living in a world of filters.
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 Tech Tip |
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by Michael
McGrath
Last week I receievd two emails that seemed very suspicious
to me. One purported to be from Compass Bank; the other purported
to be from CitiBank. Each told me a system-wide database
update was about to be performed, and asked me to assist
by clicking on the included link to verify and update my
personal information like name, address, social security
number, and account numbers. Banks don't do this; your ISPs
don't do this; no legitimate entity does it.
I use Mozilla Mail at my work station, and it's a terrific
piece of software for managing my high email volume. I mention
this for a particular reason here. When it displays messages,
it will shadow display text above the body of the main message.
Each of these two emails had a lot of shadow text displayed
above the two bank letterheads, and the shadow text had nothing
to do with the body of the emails. This is a standard practice
of both scammers and spammers, and is intended to get their
messages past whatever security (like KISS”s anti
spam filter, for instance) one might have installed.
I called the banks, each of whom I have a minor business
relationship with, to inform them of the scam campaign and
the two emails I had received. I was not the first to do
so, I was told, and the person with whom I spoke thanked
me for my diligence.
Don't fall prey to this phishing technique. No legitimate
bank, ISP, or company with whom you might do online business
sends emails to you asking for personal information. None.
If you receive such an email, don't click the links, and
don't give out any information. Your identity will be stolen,
and someone will be vacationing on your dollar. Be careful
out there, people. |
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