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Email: Configure Spam Assassin

As mentioned in our Spam Assassin Overview article, the Spam Assassin program can be quite powerful when configured correctly. The guide below is designed to assist you in the process.

• How to activate & configure Spam Assassin in SiteAdmin:
• How to active & configure Spam Assassin in cPanel:

Configuring Spam Assassin in SiteAdmin

1) Log into SiteAdmin, select Email from the left hand side menu and select Spam Protection. Or select the icon from the menu.

2) We will now need to activate Spam Assassin before we can start configuring. Select Enable Spam Assassin.

3) Now that its enabled, you will see a few other features now have the word Disabled beside them. This is normal behaviour and we will address those boxes in a a bit further down in the guide. For now we will select Configure Spam Assassin.

4) Inside this popup window you will see numerous fields that you can fill out. With the blacklist and whitelist fields, you can simply enter a email address that you want to block or allow. Alternatively if you wish to block or allow all email from a particular domain, use the wild card feature (*@domain-to-black-or-white-list.com)

Note: Should you find yourself in a situation where you need to enter more addresses/domains then the fields presently allow for, simply save the existing changes you have done, which will take you back to the Spam Assassin panel. Select Configure Spam Assassin again and you will now have more fields available to you.

blacklist_from = This allows you to specify email addresses or domains that you wish to block from being able to email you. Once listed here, any messages from the recipient or domain specified will be not be received by you.

required_score = This allows you to adjust how sensitive Spam Assassin is to incoming emails. By default, the  score is  set to 5 which is a good starting point as it will pick up a majority of the spam that comes to your email. If you  notice that  a good number of spam messages are still coming through, you could try lowering this number to 3 or 4.  While on the  other hand, if you notice that legitimate emails are not making it to your inbox, you could try increasing  the number to 7  or 8 to see if this alleviates the problem.

whitelist_from = This allows you to specify email address or domains that you wish to allow through the Spam  Assassin filter. This is helpful when you encounter particular email addresses or domains that you are getting flagged  as  spam when they shouldn’t be.

5) Now that we have the determined how to blacklist, whitelist and adjust the aggressiveness of the filter, lets now tell Spam Assassin to do with the messages it detects as spam. We have two options available: Spam Auto-Delete or Spam Box.

6) Spam Box:

 Spam Box allows you to send all messages marked as spam by SpamAssassin to a folder in your email account called  “Spam.” Doing this allows you to double check that the emails that get marked as spam so that you don’t miss any  important email messages. It is a good idea to check this folder from time to time and clear it out so that it does not build  up.

7) Spam Auto-Delete:

 Spam Auto-Delete is an extra layer of functionality. It allows you to delete all messages based a separate score level. When you enable it, you can set the auto-delete score to 8, and leave the normal SpamAssassin score at 5. By doing this, all messages with a score higher than 8 will automatically be deleted, while any emails with a score between 5 and 8 will still be moved to your or inbox or spam folder (if enabled).

If you do not enable the Spam Box or Spam Auto-Delete features, then by default any messages detected as being spam will have be directed to your inbox with ***SPAM*** added to the subject line.

Thats it! Your Spam Assassin is configured to do the most basic level filtering. If you want to learn how to use Spam Assassin to train itself on what spam messages it should filter and what ones it shouldn’t check out the related article at the bottom of this page.

Configuring Spam Assassin in cPanel

1) Log into cPanel, select the Apache Spam Assassin icon from the menu.

2) We will now need to activate Spam Assassin before we can start configuring. Select Enable Spam Assassin.

3) You are taken to a screen that now shows you that the service has been enabled, select the Go Back button.

4) Now we will need to tell Spam Assassin how to operate.  To do this select Configure Spam Assassin.

5) The screen you will be taken to will now present you with a number of fields in which you can customize. With the blacklist and whitelist fields, you can simply enter a email address that you want to block or allow. Alternatively if you wish to block or allow all email from a particular domain, use the wild card feature (*@domain-to-black-or-white-list.com)

Note: Should you find yourself in a situation where you need to enter more addresses/domains then the fields presently allow for, simply save the existing changes you have done, which will take you back to the Spam Assassin panel. Select Configure Spam Assassin again and you will now have more fields available to you.

blacklist_from = This allows you to specify email addresses or domains that you wish to block from being able to email you.  Once listed here, any messages from the recipient or domain specified will be not be received by you.

 required_score = This allows you to adjust how sensitive Spam Assassin is to incoming emails. By default, the  score is  set to  5 which is a good starting point as it will pick up a majority of the spam that comes to your email. If you  notice that a good  number of spam messages are still coming through, you could try lowering this number to 3 or 4.  While on the other hand, if  you notice that legitimate emails are not making it to your inbox, you could try increasing the number to 7 or 8 to see if this alleviates the problem

 whitelist_from = This allows you to specify email address or domains that you wish to allow through the Spam  Assassin filter.  This is helpful when you encounter particular email addresses or domains that you are getting flagged as spam when they shouldn’t be.

6) Now that we have the determined how to blacklist, whitelist and adjust the aggressiveness of the filter, lets now tell Spam Assassin to do with the messages it detects as spam. We have two options available: Spam Auto-Delete or Spam Box.

7) If you do not enable the Spam Box or Spam Auto-Delete features, then by default any messages detected as being spam will have be directed to your inbox with ***SPAM*** added to the subject line.

Spam Box allows you to send all messages marked as spam by SpamAssassin to a folder in your email account called  “Spam.” Doing this allows you to double check that the emails that get marked as spam so that you don’t miss any  important email messages. It is a good idea to check this folder from time to time and clear it out so that it does not build  up.

Spam Auto-Delete is an extra layer of functionality. It allows you to delete all messages based a separate score level. When you enable it, you can set the auto-delete score to 8, and leave the normal SpamAssassin score at 5. By doing this, all messages with a score higher than 8 will automatically be deleted, while any emails with a score between 5 and 8 will still be moved to your or inbox or spam folder (if enabled).

Thats it! Your Spam Assassin is configured to do the most basic level filtering. If you want to learn how to use Spam Assassin to train itself on what spam messages it should filter and what ones it shouldn’t check out the related article at the bottom of this page.