Email Guides and Essays
by Kaitlin Duck Sherwood,
including

Sherwood's Top Three Spam Filters in Outlook 2000/2002

With Outlook 2000 or Outlook 2002, you can make only one of Sherwood's Top Three Anti-Spam Filters. It can't look for messages with no space in the From: line or recognize embedded images.

The rules need to be in this order in the rule list (don't worry, that will make sense when you get to it). To change the rule order, simply select a rule in the rule list and click on the Move Up or Move Down buttons.

Whitelisting

If you are using Outlook 2002:

1. Add the addresses of the people you know and like into your address book (Contact Manager) if they aren't already`there.
2. Open the Rules Wizard window by selecting Tools->Rules Wizard.
3. Click on the New button in the upper right.
4. Select Start from a blank rule and click Next >.
5. Put checkmarks in the boxes next to where sender is in a specified address book and stop processing more rules. (You will need to scroll down.)
6. Click on a specified address book (which should now be in the lower pane of the window).
7. Select which address book your "good" correspondents are in and click OK.
8. Click on Next >.
9. On the next page, choose what you want to do with it. I like assigning a Category like z-ProbableSpam to it, then creating a View that Groups by Category. You could also move the message to a specific folder, but I strongly recommend not deleting it right away.

   Pick something to do with the message and click on Finish >.

1. Open the Rules Wizard window by selecting Tools->Rules Wizard.
2. Click on the New button in the upper right.
3. Select Check messages when they arrive and click Next >.
4. Put a checkmark in the box next to from people or distribution list. (You may need to scroll down to find it.)
5. Click on people or distribution list (which should now be in the lower pane of the window).
6. Select all the people whose messages you want to always get and click OK. You might want to split this rule into several different rules: one for friends, one for colleagues, one for family, etc. That way you have the option of doing different things with the different groups of messages.
7. Click on Next >.
8. On the next page, choose what you want to do with it. I like assigning a Category like z-ProbableSpam to it, then creating a View that Groups by Category. You could also move the message to a specific folder, but I strongly recommend not deleting it right away.

   Pick something to do with the message and click on Finish >.

Embedded Imges

No Real Name

	mabel@flossrecycling.com

	"Mabel Garcia" <mabel@flossrecycling.com>

If you and the sender are on the same Exchange server, that rule condition will only look at the "real name". This isn't very useful -- presumably, if the message comes from the same Exchange server, it's not spam.

Tracking IDs

1. Do steps 1 through 4 (Outlook 2002) or 1 through 3 (Outlook 2000) as described above to get to the rule conditions page.
2. Put checkmarks in the boxes next to with specific words in the subject line and stop processing more rules.
3. Click on specific words or phrases (which should now be in the lower pane of the window). Type in seven Spaces and click OK.
4. Click on Next >
5. Pick something to do with the message and click on Finish.

These filters won't catch all spam, but they will some of it -- and they are absolutely free to set up! Again, I recommend that you instead get one of the second-generation anti-spam tools if spam is a big problem for you.

For more help on catching spam, organizing your email, and other tips for getting through email faster, get my book, Overcome Email Overload with Microsoft Outlook 2000 and Outlook 2002.