# My ISP's completely pointless Spam Filter. **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [September 24, 2004, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-isps-completely-pointless-spam-filter/265906 "2004-09-24T17:50:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Lobsang](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobsang/32/4067_2.png) [@Lobsang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobsang)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2004, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-isps-completely-pointless-spam-filter/265906/1 "2004-09-24T17:50:49Z")
WTF?? It sends me an individual e-mail for every single piece of spam. What the fucking hell is the point of that?? The way it ‘works’ is, If I want the mail I reply to the spam-filter mail with some boxes ticked. then I recieve the mail. What _should_ happen, but doesn’t is that if I don’t reply, or reply with the boxes unchecked, that mail, or mail from that domain should henceforth be considered spam, and I shouldn’t even get the spam filter message. But I do. Every single time. So I can’t see the point in it. ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2004, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-isps-completely-pointless-spam-filter/265906/2 "2004-09-25T01:01:21Z")
That is, indeed, stupid. But it’s a semi-blessing, because (I’m assuming) all of the messages sent by your ISP follow a pretty rigid pattern. That means you can trivially implement a filter at your end to get rid of them once and for all. If your current mail application doesn’t support filters, or if you’re using the notoriously insecure Outlook, I’d suggest [Thunderbird](http://www.mozilla.org/products/thunderbird/), from the same folks who brought you Mozilla and Firefox. No, you shouldn’t need to. It sucks that you have to. But if this is your excuse to switch to good software, it might not be a total loss. ---
**Author:** ![ultrafilter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/3d9bf3/32.png) [@ultrafilter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ultrafilter)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2004, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-isps-completely-pointless-spam-filter/265906/3 "2004-09-25T02:22:51Z")
> [@Lobsang](#): > > WTF?? It sends me an individual e-mail for every single piece of spam. What the fucking hell is the point of that?? So you know it’s working. No, seriously, that’s pretty fucking stupid. ---
**Author:** ![Roland\_Orzabal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c2a13f/32.png) [@Roland\_Orzabal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roland_Orzabal)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2004, 5:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-isps-completely-pointless-spam-filter/265906/4 "2004-09-25T05:32:40Z")
Yeah, I daresay that takes the cake, spam-filter-wise…though Hotmail’s newly-implemented filter is pretty darned funny in its own right. The one and only reason I obtained a Hotmail address in the first place was to subscribe to Yahoo’s Canadian Tears For Fears mailing list. Because it’s Hotmail and because it’s Yahoo, though, I get about twice as much spam as I do mail regarding TFF. Hotmail’s spam filter, though, has conveniently solved this problem for me 100%. All the Hotmail-sanctioned spam [Microsoft]_which doesn’t exist!_ Honest![/Microsoft] …er, sorry about that. Looks like they’re watching. Anyhow, all the Hotmail-sanctioned spam finds its way into my Inbox, while all the Tears For Fears mailing list messages get classified as spam. So now, when I check my Hotmail, I delete everything in my Inbox without even looking and head directly to my Bulk Mail folder, which contains everything I actually want to read. Thanks, Microsoft! ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2004, 1:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-isps-completely-pointless-spam-filter/265906/5 "2004-09-25T13:02:41Z")
**Roland Orzabal** : A Gmail account would help you there. Here’s what you do: [ul] [li]If you don’t already have one, ask me for an invite. I’ve got six.[/li][li]After you’ve signed in, create a filter that will apply a label to all email from your TFF mailing list. If they all come from the same address, filter on that.[/li][li]Apply for your TFF list at your new address. Plan on forgetting about your Hotmail address.[/li][li]Revel in getting much, much less spam, and in having all your TFF mail automatically put in the same spot.[/li][/ul] From what I can tell, there’s no Google-sanctioned spam. They have AdWords, after all, but you can ignore them more easily than spam. (I still have a Yahoo mail account. It’s pretty damned amazing how much more spam that account gets than my Gmail account. And I have put my Gmail address on Usenet messages without any munging.) ---
**Author:** ![Lobsang](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobsang/32/4067_2.png) [@Lobsang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobsang)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2004, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-isps-completely-pointless-spam-filter/265906/6 "2004-09-25T16:01:56Z")
With a bit of digging around I’ve discovered I can block specific domains. But I had to go to the ISP’s website to find that. The thing I find stupid is that in the spam filter e-mails there’s “Trusted sender recieve e-mail ” but there isn’t a “Block Sender ” which would make life a lot easier. I’m lucky I don’t actually get much spam on that account. I use Outlook btw (not express) ---
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2004, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/my-isps-completely-pointless-spam-filter/265906/7 "2004-09-25T16:27:54Z")
> [@Derleth](#): > > From what I can tell, there’s no Google-sanctioned spam. They have AdWords, after all, but you can ignore them more easily than spam. Yeah, I don’t even realize they are there. Which makes wonder if they are ineffective, and will be replaced with somerhing more obtrusive later.