We’ve all heard the gripes from friends or co-workers: So-and-so received 50 e-mail messages overnight – but only three were "real," while the rest were unsolicited "spam" messages from bulk mailers pitching a can’t-miss new diet or investment tip.
Small businesses are being inundated by unwanted e-mail messages at a growing clip. In 2002, the volume of e-mail messages piling up on company servers could grow 60 to 80 percent, according to a recent BusinessWeek story citing Internet researcher and consultant David Ferris. Jupiter Media Metrix, a New York-based Internet researcher, says that by 2006, the average e-mail user will be hit with 1,400 spam e-mails annually.
For small businesses, there are myriad solutions to protect employees’ in boxes from junk e-mail, from free software programs to contract service providers that will guard against junk e-mail messages reaching employee mailboxes.
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"Basically all of these methods involve trying to resolve where the e-mail is coming from and what it’s all about," said Vincent Giordano, who manages the networking division at CORE Business Technologies, a networking firm in East Providence. "If the source is a known bulk mailer or known to send spam, the system just won’t allow it."
Giordano, who said CORE gets calls regularly from clients who complain of receiving excess spam messages, said that for small companies, a decent network firewall or virus-protection package should be enough to filter out a high percentage of spam messages.
"Security technology has become much more mainstream in recent years, and one of the benefits to businesses is technology that prevents spam on a network," Giordano said.
For example, McAfee.com, a leading provider of Web security services, markets a product called Spamkiller, released earlier this year. The tool was highly rated by leading tech resource CNET, which called it "an effective and easy-to-use tool for fighting spam." Many small companies already use McAfee software for virus protection and other security services. The Spamkiller program costs $39.95.
Symantec, known for its Norton AntiVirus software, is expected to release its own spam-filtering service later this year.
Businesses also can have their e-mail messages routed to outside service providers – such as UK-based MessageLabs or CriticalPath of San Francisco – that filter spam and viruses, according to Al Mendes, director of network services at UNICOM, a networking company in Woonsocket. While fees are usually modest, there are other costs, Mendes said.
"The problem is most companies don’t want their mail going somewhere else, because there will be a delay associated with that, so it’s performance hit," Mendes said.
Another problem with virtually any spam-filtering program: Sometimes legitimate e-mails get snared along with the junk messages.
"Any time you’re filtering something out, there’s always a chance that you filter out the wrong thing," Giordano said. "But most people are willing to take that chance."
One of the latest spam remedies takes a Napster-like approach to the problem, using a peer-to-peer networking system to block unwanted messages under a service called SpamNet, offered by San Francisco-based Cloudmark.
Users of Microsoft Outlook can download Spamnet software free from Cloudmark’s Web site and then use it to report spam offenders to the company. Cloudmark, which plans to add other e-mail programs to its service, can then prevent messages from those same offenders from reaching the rest of its members.
Most Internet service providers use their own anti-spam service. San Francisco-based Brightmail calls itself the "worldwide leader in anti-spam technology," and claims to have a 45 percent share of the anti-spam technology market.
Brightmail, which estimates that junk e-mail messages exploded 450 percent between June 2001 and June 2002, does not sell its services directly to end users. Instead, it sells its services to ISPs – including AT&T WorldNet, EarthLink, MSN, Verizon Online – to help them filter out unwanted e-mail messages at Internet gateways.
A few non-profit Web sites that provide information and tips on avoiding spam e-mail messages: www.mail-abuse.org; www.ordb.org and spam.abuse.net
