Ask Slashdot: How Effective Is Your ISP's Spam Filter?

An anonymous reader writes with the question in the title: does your ISP do a decent job culling spam? The reason I'm asking is that my ISP is Verizon and the Verizon spam filter is next to useless. It only blocks 15% of spam while also blocking 5% of legitimate emails. I've tried calling Verizon support a couple of times and the experience is about as pleasant and productive as banging my head on a wall. At this point I think my best move is to change ISP, but before I go around changing my email address at probably dozens of web sites I'd like to be sure that a new ISP would actually be better.

Comments

Why use ISP email?

[Strider-]

Uhmmm, why are you using your ISP's email in the first place? It's far better to use a third party email provider, so that you can switch ISPs at will without having to change your email address.

Re:Why use ISP email?

[ArmoredDragon]

I highly doubt gmail is going anywhere soon. Next to search, it's their most profitable business. It would almost be like saying "Google search may not be around much longer."

Re:Why use ISP email?

[Shaman]

Getting a malware attachment by email has NOTHING AT ALL to do with their server. If someone had hacked their server and was doing it, then fine... but the two issues do not go hand in hand in any way.

Re:Why use ISP email?

[TsuruchiBrian]

I don't think the OP is suggesting gmail is going anywhere soon. I think he is suggesting that they may not be round in the (not soon) future.

There was a time when AOL wasn't going anywhere anytime soon. Maybe they still aren't, but that claim is straining credulity. At the very least, being stuck with an AOL email address in 2015 is not an ideal situation to be in. Is it really so hard to imagine that one might not want to be stuck with a gmail email address in 2035?

Did you mean to submit this to SlashDot?

[xxxJonBoyxxx]

>> my ISP is Verizon and the Verizon spam filter

Not too many people 'round here are dumb enough to use their ISP as their email provider. Fix that problem first. (Closes ticket.)

No filter is truly effective

[damn_registrars]

Don't fool yourself on this one.

You can set up a filter that removes (what you consider to be) an acceptable TP:FP ratio, but it won't be effective for long. The Spammers are constantly adjusting their tactics to get around filters. Eventually the noise will take over and you will either lose an unacceptable amount of non-spam email or you will receive an unacceptable amount of spam email.

You cannot win with filters, period.

The truth of the matter - that a lot of people seem to either not be aware of or not be concerned with - is that spam is an economic problem. Spammers don't send out spam to piss you off, they send it out to make money. No amount of filtering or criminal prosecution will change that; in fact it generally just increases the total volume of spam that traverses the internet continuously. We all pay for this spam to be transmitted, stored, processed, downloaded, etc, even if we never buy any spamvertised product. We pay for it in that it increases the consumption of internet bandwidth, it increases the consumption of storage at ISPs, and has other downstream impacts as well

If you want to make a difference on spam, you need to go after the only thing spammers care about - money. The most effective tactics ever used against spam have been the ones that prevented spammers from getting paid, nothing else - not even the sum total of all the filters ever installed worldwide - has had an impact even remotely near it.

Stop thinking about filters an start thinking about solutions.

Your ISP doesn't care

[Maxwell]

They would much rather you join the 21st century and use any email service except theirs. Take the hint, choose Microsoft or Google and move on...

Number of comments is really down

[xxxJonBoyxxx]

Boy, the number of comments has really fallen on all stories since Dice's last "upgrade."