Spam, Phishing and Junk Email

• Connection Filtering: The validity of the e-mail being received is based on the reputation of the sender.
• Spam Filtering: Uses a list of characteristics that have been created by comparing spam messages and legitimate e-mails to one another over time.
• Outbound Filtering: A spam filter to prevent/stop your account from sending spam messages in case it is compromised.

Have you been the victim of a malicious spam/phishing message?

If you believe that you may have been the victim of a phishing attack where any of your Southern accounts or devices have been affected, please contact the Help Desk for assistance. It is not only for your protection, but also for the protection of the university that you have your account and university machines inspected (and cleaned if needed). We may also have you reset your password to ensure that your account and your credentials remain safe.

Reporting Phishing and Junk

If you receive a message that has passed through the spam filters and should be classified as junk/spam or a phishing scam, you can simply delete the e-mail. If you would like to take action, you can report these messages to Microsoft and help them improve their filters in the future.  Microsoft’s “Report Message” add-in tool is a built-in feature within Outlook and the Outlook Web App which allows you to easily report phishing and junk emails, as well as mark items as “Not Junk” that may have been mistakenly placed in this folder.

How to use Microsoft’s Report Message tool: PDF | VIDEO

Types of “Junk” mail

Junk e-mail as a whole is usually sent as an easily distributable means of reaching large amounts of people in attempts to advertise, attain information (for commercial or personal use), or to perform malicious actions. Junk mail is a general term for two specific kinds of unwanted e-mail; Spam and phishing. Below are the definitions for the two terms:

Spam

“E-mail that is sent to large numbers of people and that consists mostly of advertising.”

Spam is a term for unsolicited and repeated messages regarding one topic (typically advertising). A few of the reasons why there are no signs that spam will disappear anytime soon are that it has virtually no operating costs (as most companies already have the equipment just by operating their business), accountability for mass mailings is a grey area, and the barrier to entry in spamming is incredibly low. This means that others apart from businesses are able send spam.

Phishing

“A scam by which an e-mail user is duped into revealing personal or confidential information which the scammer can use illicitly.”

The purpose of phishing is to gain sensitive information about the target in order to use that information for malicious purposes. Phishers commonly use “social engineering” (an action where they pose as a trustworthy entity to lure you into downloading malicious software or using a fraudulent website) to acquire such information. Red flags that can separate a phishing e-mail from a legitimate one include spelling and bad grammar, suspicious links, and threats (like account closures and more).

Even with all of the filters to keep spam and phishing e-mails away from your inbox, mistakes can still be made. Spammers and phishers are constantly creating new types of spam or new varieties of fraudulent messages to trick users. These new types of spam will occasionally slip through the filters. False-positives can also occur, meaning non-spam messages can sometimes be filtered as well if they happen to have the same message characteristics that spam.