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Anti-Spam Methods – State-Of-The-Art Anti-Spam Methods – State-of-the-Art W. Gansterer, M. Ilger, P. Lechner, R. Neumayer, J. Strauß Institute of Distributed and Multimedia Systems Faculty of Computer Science University of Vienna, Austria March 2005 This report summarizes the results of Phase 1 of the project FA 384018 “Spamabwehr” of the Institute of Distributed and Multimedia Systems at the University of Vienna, funded by Mobilkom Austria, UPC Telekabel and Internet Service Providers Austria (ISPA). We would like to thank Mobilkom Austria, UPC Telekabel and Internet Service Providers Austria (ISPA) for their support which made this research project possible. We also would like to express our gratitude to all those commercial vendors of antispam tools who provided us with their products for experimental investigations as well as to the volunteers who provided us private e-mail messages for testing purposes. Copyright: © 2005 by University of Vienna. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form or by any means without the prior permission of the authors. The Institute of Distributed and Multimedia Systems at the University of Vienna does not guarantee the accuracy, adequacy or completeness of any information and is not responsible for any errors or omissions or the result obtained from the use of such information. Note: Experimental data not to be used for ranking purposes Since the objective of this report was the analysis of existing methodology and not a comprehensive and detailed evaluation or comparison of available anti-spam products/tools, the results of our experiments must not be interpreted as a “ranking”. In order to produce a sound basis for a rigorous “ranking” of various anti-spam products/tools more effort has to be spent on defining comparable parameter settings and on fine tuning. 2 About the Authors Project “Spamabwehr” was launched in summer 2004 at the Department of Computer Science (Distributed Systems group) which, due to internal restructuring at the University of Vienna, became the new Institute of Distributed and Multimedia Systems at the Faculty of Computer Science. The team: Dr. Wilfried Gansterer (project leader), Michael Ilger, Peter Lechner, Robert Neumayer and Jürgen Strauß. From left to right: J. Strauß, M. Ilger, P. Lechner, W. Gansterer, R. Neumayer Contact for Project “Spamabwehr”: phone: +43-1-4277-39650 e-mail: Each team member can be contacted at [email protected] The institution: The Faculty of Computer Science (Fakultät für Informatik) is currently lead by Dean Prof. Dr. Günter Haring. The Institute of Distributed and Multimedia Systems, headed by Prof. DDr. Gerald Quirchmayr, is one of the institutes within this faculty. Institute of Distributed and Multimedia Systems University of Vienna Lenaugasse 2/8, A-1080 Vienna (Austria) 3 Table of Content EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ..................................................................................................................6 1. INTRODUCTION........................................................................................................................9 1.1. WHAT IS “SPAM”?...............................................................................................................10 1.2. STATISTICAL DATA .............................................................................................................11 1.2.1. Total Amount of Spam...............................................................................................11 1.2.2. Sources of Spam........................................................................................................13 1.2.3. Content of Spam........................................................................................................14 1.3. THE ECONOMIC BACKGROUND ...........................................................................................15 1.3.1. Why Spam?................................................................................................................15 1.3.2. Damage Caused by Spam..........................................................................................18 1.3.3. Conclusion ................................................................................................................18 1.4. THE TECHNICAL BACKGROUND ..........................................................................................19 1.4.1. Simple Mail Transfer Protocol..................................................................................19 1.4.2. Internet Message Format ..........................................................................................20 1.4.3. Spammers’ Techniques..............................................................................................21 2. ANTI-SPAM METHODS..........................................................................................................23 2.1. QUALITY CRITERIA FOR ANTI-SPAM METHODS ..................................................................23 2.2. SENDER SIDE (=PRE-SEND) METHODS ................................................................................25 2.2.1. Increasing Sender Costs............................................................................................25 2.2.2. Increasing Spammers’ Risk.......................................................................................29 2.3. RECEIVER SIDE (=POST-SEND) METHODS...........................................................................30 2.3.1. Approaches Based on Source of Mail .......................................................................30 2.3.2. Approaches Based on Content ..................................................................................38 2.3.3. Using Source and Content ........................................................................................41 2.4. SENDER AND RECEIVER SIDE ..............................................................................................47 2.4.1. IM 2000.....................................................................................................................48 2.4.2. AMTP ........................................................................................................................48 3. PRODUCTS AND TOOLS .......................................................................................................49 3.1. OVERVIEW ..........................................................................................................................49 3.1.1. Quality Criteria.........................................................................................................49 3.1.2. Comparisons of Anti-Spam Software ........................................................................49 3.2. COMMERCIAL PRODUCTS.....................................................................................................50 3.2.1. Symantec Brightmail Anti-Spam ...............................................................................50 3.2.2. Kaspersky Anti-Spam ................................................................................................52 3.2.3. SurfControl E-Mail Filter for SMTP.........................................................................53 3.2.4. Symantec Mail Security for SMTP ............................................................................55 3.2.5. Borderware MXtreme Mail Firewall ........................................................................57 3.2.6. Ikarus mySpamWall ..................................................................................................57 3.2.7. Spamkiss....................................................................................................................58 3.3. OPEN SOURCE .....................................................................................................................60 3.3.1. SpamAssassin............................................................................................................60 3.3.2. CRM 114 ...................................................................................................................61 3.3.3. Bogofilter ..................................................................................................................62 4. PERFORMANCE EVALUATION ..........................................................................................63 4.1. SOURCES FOR OUR OWN SAMPLES......................................................................................63 4.1.1. University of Vienna..................................................................................................63 4.1.2. Mobilkom Austria......................................................................................................63 4.1.3. UPC Telekabel..........................................................................................................64 4.2. TEST SAMPLE DESCRIPTION .................................................................................................64 4 4.2.1. Our Test Sample........................................................................................................64 4.2.2. SpamAssassin Test Sample........................................................................................65 4.3. EXPERIMENTAL SETUP ........................................................................................................65 4.3.1. Windows Test Process...............................................................................................66 4.3.2. Linux Test Process ....................................................................................................66
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