Pacific University protects faculty, staff, and student email accounts from unwanted and malicious messages via a spam filter. These filters take a large number of factors into account to guess whether an email is spam/malicious or not. These factors include the reputation of the “from” email address, the reputation of the server that sent the message, the reputation of sites linked to in the email, keywords in the message, whether or not an attachment or embedded image is present, and the amount of text in the message. The rules utilized by these spam filters are constantly changing (to try to keep up with ever-changing strategies used by spammers) so a message that is not filtered today might be filtered tomorrow, or vice versa.
Depending on the likelihood a message is spam or malicious, a message may be delivered to you but placed in your Spam folder or it may not be delivered to you at all.
Two types of errors with spam filtering can happen:
- A false positive is when a message that is legitimate is marked as spam and treated accordingly.
- A false negative is when a message that is spam or malicious is not marked as such.
Procedure
Dealing With False Positives as a Sender
To reduce the likelihood that the messages you send are incorrectly marked as spam or malicious, do the following:
- The number one reason messages are filtered as spam is because some recipients mark them as such, which can then lead to them being marked as spam for recipients who didn't mark them as spam. Whenever possible, make sure recipients have opted into getting emails from you, or explain to them why they are receiving emails from you, and give them clear information on how to opt-out of receiving emails from you.
- Send messages only from your Pacific University email account. Do not allow other online services to send using an @pacificu.edu email address (unless UIS has specifically configured this service to be able to do so).
- Send messages to known good addresses. Sending bulk messages to bad or unmonitored email addresses is a common trigger for anti-spam filters.
- Avoid words and phrases commonly associated with commercial offers, such as "free," "opportunity," or "discount," especially in the subject line.
- Give each message a unique and meaningful subject line (as opposed to subject lines like “urgent!” or “read me”).
- Rather than emailing attachments, store files in BOX with proper security and sending a shared link that you generate and place in the body of the email message.
- When sending an attachment, describe what the attachment is in the body of the email.
- If a recipient reports not seeing some or all of your messages, advise them to check their “Spam” folder. You can also ask them to mark your messages as “not spam."
- Utilize Google Groups or Google's Mail Merge feature to communicate with moderate numbers of recipients.
- Work with the Marketing & Communication division of University Advancement to send mass emails, utilizing their email tools, to Pacific employees, students, alumni and donors. Mass emails are the most likely to be marked as spam, and Marketing & Communication's email tools utilize current best practices to avoid this.
Dealing With False Positives as a Recipient
The best practice is to periodically review your “Spam” folder to see if any legitimate messages have ended up there. If you find a legitimate message in your spam folder you can mark it as "Not Spam" by opening the email and clicking the “Not spam” button at the top. Adding a person's email address to your Contacts will prevent mail from that person as being marked as spam (unless, according to Google, "we know with high confidence that [the messages] are spam").
You can also refer senders to the Dealing With False Positives as a Sender section above.
If you are asking people to send you information or files, consider using systems other than email. These systems can give you options and ease of management that email does not. If you are asking for information, you could utilize Qualtrics or Google Forms (using your Pacific University login) to create and send a survey. If you are asking for files, you can create shared folders in Box and ask people to upload files to them (via a Box File Request Link). Consult with the Technology Helpdesk if you would like to learn more about using these tools.
Dealing With False Negatives
The best way to deal with false negatives (messages you receive that were not marked as spam) is to mark them as spam.
In BoxerMail, you can open a message and use the “Report spam” button (octagon with exclamation mark).
Diligent marking as spam can reduce, but will not eliminate, the amount of spam you receive.
See Also
Google Support Article: Mark or unmark Spam in Gmail
Request an Email Campaign (University Advancement Service Catalog entry)
Using File Request to get Content From Anyone (Box)
Questions?
Contact Support