ITS Documentation

Using the Do Not Spam List to Reduce Spam

S4323 • December 2012

You can opt to have e-mail from known spam sources blocked so that it never gets to your mailbox. This service uses published lists from a vendor to identify this mail, which is then blocked. Blocked mail is rejected and not accepted for delivery. This document explains how using the Do Not Spam List can reduce your spam.

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How the Do Not Spam List Works

ITS has purchased the use of several spam-blocking lists for its Do Not Spam List service. You can use it for your

  • Individual e-mail. Turn it on for your personal mail to have all mail addressed to youruniqname@umich.edu (where youruniqname has been replaced with your own uniqname) checked against the list.

  • Group e-mail. Turn it on for groups in the MCommunity Directory that you own to have all incoming mail addressed to those groups (in the form of groupname@umich.edu, where groupname has been replaced with the actual name of the group) checked against the list.

If a message is from an IP (Internet Protocol) address included in the Do Not Spam List, that message is rejected (not accepted for delivery). This not only eliminates much of your spam mail, it reduces the load on campus e-mail systems.

IMPORTANT! Using the list will not eliminate all your spam. The purchased spam-blocking lists are very conservative in the addresses they includes. This is done to reduce the likelihood of rejecting a legitimate piece of mail.

Flow chart showing how the Do Not Spam List works.

The purchased lists include IP (Internet Protocol) addresses of known spammers, addresses of machines that should not be sending e-mail, and more.

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Who Can Use the Do Not Spam List

Anyone who has an entry in the MCommunity Directory and who uses uniqname@umich.edu (where uniqname is replaced with your own uniqname) as their e-mail address can use the Do Not Spam List for the mail they receive at that address.

Anyone who owns a group in MCommunity can use it for that group(s).

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A Word of Caution

Blocked mail is rejected and therefore not accepted for U-M delivery; it cannot be retrieved. While most people will find that use of the Do Not Spam List blocks only spam, some people may occasionally miss receiving a legitimate message. If you correspond with people who use ISPs listed on the purchased spam-blocking lists, you may miss wanted e-mail. If this is a concern for you, we recommend that you

  • Use the Block Status Check Tool to see if a particular address from which you want to receive mail would be blocked. This tool allows you to enter an IP address, e-mail address, or domain name and then find out if it would be blocked.

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The Do Not Spam List Is On Automatically

The Do Not Spam List is turned on automatically for all new members of the university community when their MCommunity Directory profile is created for them. It is also turned on for all new MCommunity groups.

Your profile and the Do Not Spam List setting (called Spam Filtering) Your groups and the Do Not Spam List setting
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Mail Delivery Troubleshooting

The Troubleshooting Mail Delivery page provides information and tools to help you and your correspondents deal with mail delivery problems that might occur.

These two tools are provided:

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Additional Resources

Visit ITS's Information System to obtain ITS computer documentation and other resources. A list of relevant documents follows:

The ITS Service Center provides a variety of computing help resources.

For further help with this or any other topic, call 734-764-HELP [4357] or submit an online service request.

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