New Anti-Spam Software Deployed On Email Gateways
The University has transitioned from the previous anti-spam filter, Pure Message from Sophos, to a new anti-spam/malware/phishing filter from Proofpoint. This switch is being made in response to the growing amounts of spam messages that are getting delivered and the increased reporting of spam to University IT (UIT). Proofpoint comes strongly recommended from other peer institutions, some of which had also made the switch from Sophos. The Proofpoint deployment started Aug 28th and was fully deployed during the first week of September.
Another problem faced by the University is the potential to become a spammer out to the Internet. This comes with the potential of being blacklisted, which means that other companies/organizations that subscribe to these lists would automatically drop any email from Stanford based on the sending address. To address these concerns, there is also an effort underway to integrate Proofpoint into the outbound email stream. As recently as this year, the University was added to an email blacklist due to excessive spamming. The process for getting removed becomes a very time consuming process for the University. Deploying Proofpoint in the outgoing email stream will help keep the University off of the black lists and maintain Stanford's reputation as a responsible Internet citizen.
More details about Proofpoint can be found on the various email service pages:
https://itservices.stanford.edu/service/emailcalendar/email/spam
https://itservices.stanford.edu/service/emailcalendar/email/spam/virusgateway
https://itservices.stanford.edu/service/emailcalendar/email/phishing
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