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CurtB's avatar
CurtB
Valued Contributor III
3 years ago

How to: Prevent Webmail Spam

The following is a consolidation of material from other Forum posts and some new information to assist Webmail users in blocking unwanted email.  Filter Rules can help reduce the amount of spam you receive.

Filter Rules vs Blocked Senders - Blocked Senders is limited to 250 individual email addresses that are filed into Spam.  Filter Rules can block individual email addresses and entire domains with no theoretical limit.  They can file into Spam or other folders or discard and you never need to see unwanted email at all.

First: Turn off Webmail spam filtering that routes to Spam the email that Webmail determined to be spam.  Webmail > Settings icon > Settings > Inbox > Spam settings > No Spam filtering 

Second: Create Filter Rules to determine email you want or don't want and how you want to handle it.  Webmail > Settings icon > Settings > Inbox > Filter Rules > Add new rule 

Difference between Discard and File into Trash
Action > File into > Select folder > Trash > OK          Incoming email is moved to Trash.
Action > Discard                                                             No incoming email is received.

Difference between Keep and File into Inbox
Action > Keep                                                               Incoming email is moved to Inbox. 
 (This would be used with subsequent rules).
Action > File into > Select folder > Inbox > OK        Incoming email is copied to Inbox.
(For email going to Inbox anyway, this creates a second copy and typically wouldn't be used).

Rules are processed from top to bottom with the highest priority rule on top.                        

Unckecking "Process subsequent rules" will prevent lower priority rules from processing.                       
 
Filter Rules default is "Apply rule if all conditions are met",  Each condition may have multiple values.  The rule will run if a value is matched in each condition.  It will fail unless all conditions are met.

Filter Rules  "Apply rule if any conditions is met",  The rule will run if at least one condition is met..
 
Example 1: Discard all email with “USA Wild Seafood” display name regardless of email address,
Condition:  From        Contains                              USA Wild Seafood
Action:        Discard
 
Example 2: Discard all email from person1@this.com and from everyone with @that.com.
Condition:  From         Contains                             person1@this.com 
Condition:  From         Contains                             @that.com
Action:        Discard 

Example 3:  Discard all email from @other.com except from person2@other.com.
Condition:  From         Contains                              @other.com
Condition:  From         Contains not                       person2@other.com
Action:        Discard 

Example 4: File all email from @something.com into a folder you created called MyWork.
Condition:  From         Contains                              @something.com
Action:        File into    Select folder                        MyWork 

The best way to become familiar with Filter Rules is to create a test rule and send yourself an email.

  • Bruce's avatar
    Bruce
    Honored Contributor III

    Good stuff.  As widermouthopen used to write, "this is bookmark worthy"!  But you won't find his quote because Cox cancelled him.

    • WiderMouthOpen's avatar
      WiderMouthOpen
      Esteemed Contributor

      Still reading the forum, even if I am not posting much because my posts get erased. Defiantly bookmark worthy! Let's hope me posting here doesn't get the post deleted.