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52 Configuring email settings
Understanding spam settings
Configuring suspected spam
Choosing language identification type
Software acceleration
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Note: This feature is only available if you are running Symantec Premium
AntiSpam (SPA). If you would like to know more about this feature, contact your
Symantec representative.
When evaluating whether messages are spam, Symantec Mail Security for SMTP
calculates a spam score from 1 to 100 for each message, based on techniques
such as pattern matching and heuristic analysis. If an email scores in the range
of 90 to 100 after being filtered by Symantec Mail Security for SMTP, it is
defined as spam.
For more aggressive filtering, you can optionally define a discrete range of
scores from 25 to 89. The messages that score within this range will be
considered "suspected spam." Unlike spam, which is determined by Symantec
and not subject to adjustment by administrators, you can adjust the trigger for
suspected spam. Using policies, you can specify different actions for messages
identified as suspected spam and messages identified as spam by Symantec.
For example, assume that you have configured your suspected spam scoring
range to encompass scores from 80 through 89. If an incoming message receives
a spam score of 83, Symantec Mail Security for SMTP will consider this message
to be suspected spam, and will apply the action you have in place for suspected
spam messages, such as Modify the Message (tagging the subject line). Messages
that score 90 or above will not be affected by the suspected spam scoring setting,
and will be subject to the action you have in place for spam messages, such as
Quarantine the Message.
Note: Symantec recommends that you not adjust the spam threshold until you
have some exposure into the filtering patterns at your site. Then, gradually
move the threshold setting down 1 to 5 points per week until the number of false
positives is at the highest level acceptable to you. A great way to test the effects
of spam scoring is to set up a designated mailbox or user to receive false positive
notifications to monitor the effects of changing the spam score threshold.
Language identification is the ability to block or allow messages written in a
specified language. For example, you can choose to only allow English and
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