SpamPal requires a little bit of work
to set up, but this shouldn't take more than ten minutes and once
completed, you can almost forget it's there.
There are seven stages to installation process:
1. Install
SpamPal
2. Configure SpamPal
3. Configure your email program
4. Create Filter/Message Rules
5. Email Virus Scanners and Firewalls
6. Whitelist friends and contacts
7. Using Blacklists
Let's begin...
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Before installing SpamPal, it's a good idea
to first make sure that all your email accounts are working correctly.
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SpamPal can either be configured
to run in transparent
or non-transparent
mode.
a) In non-transparent
mode, the user has to reconfigure
their email program to use it. This can sometimes cause problems
for people, as changes have to be made to Username, Server Name
and sometimes even port numbers, in order to get SpamPal to filter
their email. So before
you make any changes, take a note
of your user id
and pop3 server name
b) In transparent mode, the user
doesn't have to reconfigure their email program to use it (apart
from a simple message rule).
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a) You will need administration
rights to perform
the initial installation/initialization of the transparent
proxy
- although admin rights aren't required to actually use it.
b) The transparent
mode version of SpamPal
is not installed by default for existing users of SpamPal.
There are three ways
the SpamPal transparent proxy can be installed:
1).
If you select the Custom
install type and choose the install
layered service provider option.
2).
If you go into the Connections
area of the SpamPal options
window and create any port settings with the proxy
type set to transparent.
3). If SpamPal cannot
find a configuration folder; it assumes this is a new installation
and creates a new configuration for you, and installs the
transparent proxy (this assumes that the user is running Window
2000/XP)
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| Now, download SpamPal and start
installation by double-clicking on the SpamPal Setup program (spampal.exe)
and follow the on-screen instructions: |
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Upon completion, SpamPal will run, showing
its pink umbrella icon in your system tray.
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If this installation
is an upgrade of SpamPal then the existing configuration is retained
and the process is now complete.
If this is a new installation of SpamPal, proceed with the steps below: |
| The first
time SpamPal runs, you will see the following Welcome
Screen: |
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Now, you have to decide how you wish to run
SpamPal:
a) SpamPal can run in the background as
a normal application,
this is the prefered method for single users of a machine, Windows
95/98 users or Windows
2000/XP users that don't
have access to administrator rights.
b) SpamPal can run in the background as a service,
should be the prefered method when multiple users, on a Windows
2000/XP pc, are sharing the same machine.
In the past, SpamPal has always run as an application.
Most programs you run on your computer will be applications. An application
is a program that isintended to be used by one
user at a time.
If a second user logs in and needs to use an application, a second
instance of the application must be executed and your computer is
then effectively running two separate application programs, which
happen to be identical.
A Windows Service
is one program that can be shared by
all the users of your computer. If a second user needs to
use a service you're using, they can share the same instance of
that service.
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a)
The service version
mode of SpamPal can only
run on Windows 2000 or Windows XP
b) You'll need administrator
rights to your machine.
c) The service version
of SpamPal does not
run the Bayesian plugin very well
and so this plugin should be disabled. |
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You
may, at this point, get an error message about SpamPal not being
able to listen on the standard POP3/IMAP4 ports.
This is nothing to be worried about; just write down the port
number SpamPal tells you and continue with this guide
This message means SpamPal is using Port 1110
instead of 110.
You don't have to put it into SpamPal because SpamPal already
knows it is using port 110.
Instead, you have to tell your email program (for example Outlook
Express) to use port 1110
instead of 110.
If you try to install SpamPal and port 110
is already in use, you get a warning message and SpamPal switches
to a different port. If you don't know what is using port 110,
it is a good idea to find out. It might be an obsolete av-scanner
that needs removing. It could be another antispam product you
tried once that didn't uninstall properly. It could be lots
of things.
The latest version of Netstat in Windows
XP has an option to display owners. This is run from the command
prompt as:
C>NETSTAT
-o
Please note this option
is only available in the XP version, not 2000 or earlier
For an easy-to-use utility that works
with Winn98, 2000 and XP
see: http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/source/tcpview.shtml
This small utility just runs out of
the box, no setup needed. I suggest you start the program
running then select:
View,
Update Speed, Paused
Then look down the column labelled
local addresses to
find one which reads either:
127.0.0.1:110 or:
machine:pop3
where machine
is the name you have assigned to your own machine in windows.
To toggle between the two formats, use Ctrl/R.When you find
the line you want, double clicking on it displays the program
path which will let you identify what it was and take remedial
action if necessary.
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| Choose the level
of filtering that SpamPal will start with, the default is Medium
level, although if you are really nervous, choose the Safe
level. |
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| the
level you choose can be modified later, if the level you have
choosen is filtering too little (or too much) |
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The next screen gives
you three options:
a. Assume ALL
mail from Chrian, Korea and Taiwan is spam |
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If
you are a global company or you receive a lot of genuine email
from China, Korea or Japan then untick
the above option, as all emails will automatically be marked
as spam.
Once you have setup a good whitelist, you can always re-enable
the option to block countries, at a later date |
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| b.
to use the RegExFilter plugin (which
is disabled by default) See Plugins
page for more details |
| c.
to use the UrlBody plugin (which
is enabled by default) See Plugins
page for more details |
| If you have decided to install SpamPal
as an application then you can skip
the next hightlighted sections. |
| Now that the SpamPal
program had been installed, it will now launch itself
and you should see the SpamPal umbrella icon in your systray:
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| All you need to know about
extra configuration can be found here |
::Top:: |
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If you are using SpamPal in transparent
mode then you shouldn't need to
change any of the server settings in your email program and
can now jump to the next section, which show
you how to setup the message rules.
So, assuming you're running SpamPal non-transparent
mode then you now have to configure
your email program, so that all emails are received through
the SpamPal POP3/IMAP4 Proxy,
instead of directly through to your ISP's POP3/IMAP
Server.
If you want to use Hotmail or
Yahoo then you will see to use
additional third party tools, see this
page for more information.
If you are an MSN user, you may
have some luck using the following server names when you configure
your setup:
POP3 Server:
pop3.email.msn.com
SMTP Server:
smtp.email.msn.com
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If you are using SpamPal in transparent
mode then you shouldn't need to
change any of the server settings in your email program and
can now jump to the next section, which show
you how to setup the message rules.
However, if you cannot run SpamPal
in transparent mode then the following
generic setup instructions can now be used to setup your email program,
however, specific setup
details for your email program
can be found here
To reconfigure your email program, first
make a careful note of your original settings.
You should append whatever
value you currently have in your
HOST setting, to whatever
you currently have in the Username
field (seperated
with a @ sign), and change the HOST
setting to 127.0.0.1.
e.g. if your original
values were:
Host: your.mailserver.com
Username: fred.bloggs
then you would, for example, change them
to:
Host: 127.0.0.1
Username: fred.bloggs@your.mailserver.com
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For example, before
using SpamPal your email program setup would look something like
this:
| mail.btopenworld.com
| Port:
| 110
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| my_login_name
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| ********
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Afterwards, your new email program
setup would, for example, look like this:
| 127.0.0.1
| Port:
| 110
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| my_login_name@mail.btopenworld.com
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| ********
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| Incoming
Mail (POP3):mail.btopenworld.com |
Incoming
Mail (POP3): 127.0.0.1 |
| Username:
fred.bloggs |
Username:
fred.bloggs@mail.btopenworld.com |
| Incoming
Mail (POP3): pop.west.cox.net |
Incoming
Mail (POP3): 127.0.0.1 |
| Username:
johnsmith |
Username:johnsmith@pop.west.cox.net |
| Incoming
Mail (POP3): pop.telus.net |
Incoming
Mail (POP3): 127.0.0.1 |
| Username:
fax07734 |
fax07734@pop.telus.net |
| Incoming
Mail (POP3):
192.168.1.1 |
Incoming
Mail (POP3): 127.0.0.1 |
| Username:
mary_jones |
Username:
mary_jones@192.168.1.1 |
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The
above Incoming POP3
Server Name, can be called:
Incoming Mail Server,
POP3 server, POP3 Username or Account Name depending on your
email program.
There are also two ways of specifying the local
server name, which should mean exactly the same thing (but on
some system only one of them will work): localhost
or 127.0.0.1 |
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continue as if it didn't; SpamPal is able to cope with usernames
that contain two @s without difficulty. |
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| Click
the Settings...
button beside it. Now, select Log
on using and enter your
original username and
password i.e.. what they
were before
you modified the username to install SpamPal |
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| Append
the port number to the server name in the login name field using
a colon. For example, if BlueYonder ran their POP3 server on
port 8090, I'd end
up with a login name of jf004d7582@pop3.blueyonder.co.uk:8090
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should
use a '%' symbol instead
of a '@', i.e.jjf%pop.clara.net.
People using elderly versions of other mail programs may also
need to use a '%' sign. |
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will have to change the port your mail program makes the POP3
connection on. The way of doing this will differ for each mail
client, but it should be somewhere near where you set the name
of the POP3 server, perhaps in an Advanced tab? Change this
to the value you wrote down earlier. |
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If you have more than one POP3 mailbox,
repeat this step for each of them.
Now Click on Send/Receive
on your email program and you should see that the SpamPal umbrella
icon in the system tray starts to revolve:
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Your
firewall software will probably inform you that SpamPal.exe
is trying to access the internet, this is completely
normal and you should
tell your firewall, to allow Spampal access to the internet.
SpamPal will also, from time to time, access it's own homepage
to check for updates, again, your firewall may warn you about
this, so again, tell your firewall to allow Spampal access
to the internet
See Step Four below, for additional
help setting up your firewall |
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| If you are still having a problem,
why not give this setup page a try |
::Top:: |
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You should now see emails being received
as normal, however, if SpamPal thinks that an email is spam
then the Subject line
will have **SPAM**
added to the beginning of your Subject
line and an extra header
will be added to your message; X-SpamPal:
SPAM
From:
i_am_a@spammer.co.uk
To: yourname@yourisp.co.uk
Subject: **SPAM**
FREE $ FOR YOU !!!
Date: Tue, 24 Jun 2003 13:30:40 +0100
X-SpamPal:
SPAM SPCOP xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx |
In order to help separate this spam from
your normal inbox, you need to setup a message
rule, in your email program,
to move these tagged messages into a spamtrap
folder.
Start by creating this folder; you can call it anything you like,
but for the purposes of this document, I'll assume you've called
it spamtrap. Exactly how you create
a folder will depend upon your mail program.
Now create a new filter to filter any incoming
mail for which the header X-SpamPal: contains
SPAM into the spamtrap folder. Again,
exactly how to do this will depend upon your mail program.
(If your mail client doesn't allow filtering on arbitrary headers,
then filtering for subject lines
containing
**SPAM** will have the same effect.)
So far the we've only looked at general instructions
that should be sufficient to get SpamPal working with any email
program, specific instructions,
can be found here.
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Some email virus filters want to sit between
your mail program and your mail server, in just the way that SpamPal
does.
There's actually no reason why they can't; you just have them setup
in serial (often called a chain), so that your virus filter fetches
its mail through SpamPal rather than directly from your mailserver,
and then your email program fetches the mail through the virus filter.
See the following links for more details on how to setup your software:
Using SpamPal with AntiVirus software
Using SpamPal with
Firewalls
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In order to speed up the processing of your emails
and to prevent SpamPal from marking your friends or contact's emails
as spam, it's a good idea at this point to whitelist all your important
email addresses.
This can be done in four ways:
a) Use the pop3
automatic whitelist: this will whitelist non-spam
email's that you receive on a frequent basis
b) Use the smtp
automatic whitelist: which (if setup in 3.3)
will whitelist all email addresses that you send out
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you are using this, especially in a business, as this is recording
all outgoing addresses, some people might view this as an infringement
upon their privacy, (if you are in UK you need to tell staff
of this policy before you start collecting data) |
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c) use
the Add to Whitelist option on
SpamPal's system tray: to manually
whitelist your email addresses by typing in an address (or by using
the dropdown box; to select from a list of recently received address):
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| If
you wish to select a number of whitelist entries then you can
tick the Keep dialog open option and you can then keep selecting
your whitelist entries, one after another. Once you've finished,
you can un-tick the Keep dialog open option |
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| d)
Use the SpamPal Whitelist
Email Addresses page to manually
whitelist your email addresses: |
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The
whitelist function only looks for email addresses in certain
headers of your email.
These headers are currently: From:,
Reply-To:,
Sender:, Mailing-List:
and Return-Path: |
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| This completes the installation
and setup. |
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Please don't use massive
email address blacklists with SpamPal,
particularly not those from general purpose sites. Those are intended
for spam detecting systems which can't use DNS blacklists, regular
expressions or other advanced spam detection methods.
Using a massive blacklist is not usually productive, as spammers usually
forge their email address and never
use the same address twice. If you regularly get spam from the same
address and for some reason it is not being picked up by the public
blacklists then it can be useful to add it to your own personal blacklist.
However, most people only have a handful of
addresses in their blacklists. If
you have too many you will slow down SpamPal quite significantly,
and be creating a lot of work for yourself without achieving anything
useful.
This reasoning also applies to email programs, such as Outlook and
Outlook Express that have the facility to block senders by email address
(called Junk
Senders/Adult Content senders). It is usually better to
stop using those features and leave SpamPal to do it's job.
The first way to cut the spam with SpamPal is
to adjust the DNS blacklists. Using Spamhaus and SpamCop should
catch 90% of spam for most people. If you don't get at least that
high a detection rate, or want a higher rate, let
us know and we'll make more suggestions to help to improve the
success.
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