Alun
> Sent: Monday, October 03, 2005 10:34 AM
> To: [email protected]
> Subject: Re: [exim] Reducing Spam Assassin Load
> 
> Marc Perkel <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said, in message
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]:
> >
> > But no one has done anything to reduce load  processing ham. 
> 
> Here's what we do. If I send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], my exim 
> drops an entry in a database ([EMAIL PROTECTED], 
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]). Any mail from [EMAIL PROTECTED] to 
> [EMAIL PROTECTED] is whitelisted on the basis that we've already 
> swapped mails, and so doesn't go through out spam filters.

Which has the disadvantage of exposing you to 
spam under several not too unlikely circumstances:

  1) Someone harvests addressess from a list (e.g.,
        this one) where you are both members and
        sends to some members from another member.

  2) You are both in someone else's email address
        book who becomes a virus/trojan bot and
        shares the lists or sends the spam directly.

  3) Your actual correspondent is the victim in #2

  4) Your actual correspondent, especially in the case 
        of a commercian concern, becomes the spammer.

You can overcome #1 and #2 by using schemes like
SPF and the new (3.10) SpamAssassin whitelist_from_rcvd
(as opposed to simple whitelist_from), or the 
greylistd (e.g., Python implementation) which can use
singlets, doublets, or triplets (sending_server, from,
rcpt) to whitelist (or blacklist.)

You can ameliorate #3 and #4 by using the whitelist ONLY
to offer a moderate/appropriate score adjustment and
still checking the spam.

But this latter does not reduce load on SpamAssassin.


--
Herb Martin



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