Spam Filter: Your Solution For A Growing Problem

Everyone who has ever received and read email knows that a significant portion of their time is going to be spent dealing with spam. There is a steadily growing torrent of spam and unsolicited email messages that threaten to consume so much of our time. Some of us are able to deal with this issue and handle it in stride with the help of a spam filter software. Others become so overwhelmed and frustrated by it, that they dread the task of having to check their email at all.

It all started back in May of 1994 when the law firm of Canter & Siegel began posting bulk advertising messages to the Usenet community. Within a year, numerous other advertising had copied the practice and the number of spam messages increased ten fold over the next few years. These messages were received quite negatively by the community at large, but obviously that did not deter others from copying this advertising tactic.

The spam issue continues to be a growing problem. The number of spam messages has increased over 15 times to what it was 5 years ago. Some people estimate that up to 80% of the traffic on the Internet is related to spam and go so far as to say that spam will eventually completely paralyze internet traffic.

Programs designed to offer email spam protection started to emerge in 1995. The programs struggled to properly and accurately identify and delete spam messages without eliminating legitimate emails. By 1999 the movement was towards anti spam filter programs that would reroute spam messages from the inbox folder to a junk mail folder.

Since the year 2000 the governments of the United States and some other countries around the world have enacted measures to levy fines and impose prison terms for spam and other internet related offenses. But that has not done much to stem the growing tide of spam. Many service providers have chosen to enable spam filters or spam blockers directly on their mail servers.

Personal email spam protection and junk email protection software is still the best option for effectively reducing the amount of spam that reaches your computer. Messages that are identified as spam or that do not meet certain criteria will be placed into a special junk email folder. A small amount of junk mail will still get through to your inbox and some legitimate messages may be rerouted by the spam filter. However, a significantly smaller portion of the time spent checking email will be squandered reading and deleting spam.