[NCLUG] SpamAssassin Testimonials?

[Michael Milligan]

Rich Young wrote:
> Hi, all-
> 	We're considering installing SpamAssassin, and some 
> of my users here aren't familiar enough with it to know 
> whether they should support the plan or not. I would 
> appreciate it if a few of you who have had personal 
> experience with SpamAssassin could reply to me off list 
> with your brief thoughts on its effectiveness as a spam 
> reduction tool.  

I'd like to respond on-list as I'm interested in other data points as well.

> I'd be especially grateful for comments on:
> - accidental filtering of legitimate messages

Very very rare.  I can't remember the last time it happened here.

> - difficulties adjusting the threshold to optimal level

Pretty much figured out already.  I've had to do no adjustments in the 
last 6 months, only additions to the whitelist.

> - numeric estimates on how much spam reduction it provided

Catches 99% of spam in my case.  I file all Spam-deemed mail into a 
separate folder that I periodically look in for false-positives.

> - how much maintenance it requires to stay ahead of the 
>    spammers

On Debian, "apt-get update; apt-get upgrade".

> - any issues regarding using it in a business setting 
>    with multiple users

None that I can think of.  Spam is spam regardless of where you get it.

A brief overview of how I use SpamAssassin.  It's integrated with my 
receiving MTA, Postfix, as a content filter.  I use the spamc/spamd 
approach so there's no possibility of lost mail.  SpamAssassin does it's 
checking, adds extra headers, then re-inserts the message into the spool 
for delivery.  If the message is deemed Spam, it adds an X-Spam-Flag 
header to the message.  When the message is next delivered locally, it 
goes to a Cyrus IMAP server via LMTP.  Cyrus uses the Sieve filtering 
language to do server-side auto-filing, so I key off the X-Spam-Flag 
header to auto-file Spam messages into a Spam holding folder.  That 
folder I periodically check for false-positives.

Regards,
Mike

-- 
Michael Milligan  --  Free Agent  --  milli at acmeps.com