It's been somewhat of a running joke in the email marketing community that the spam filtering companies don't really have any incentive to "solve" the spam problem. After all, if they were to fix it, then they would be out of business!

In many ways, the spam filter companies could be compared to weapons manufacturers. Now, McAfee certainly isn't as bad as Haliburton, in fact I think they are a good company that helps protect millions of people from spam and viruses. But like the weapons manufacturers don't really want the wars to end, I don't think the executives at McAfee are really interested in solving the spam problem.

This week BBC reported on the results of a study commissioned by McAfee to try and justify their perpetual existence. They came to the conclusion that you need a spam filter. "Surfing the web unprotected will leave the average web user with 70 spam messages each day."

Wow, that was a striking conclusion. Who doesn't have a spam filter? Every free email account, broadband email account, and most corporate email accounts have spam filters.

The BBC article ended with a quote that shows how self serving the whole thing was, "It is such an immense problem and it's never going to go away. It's no longer a question of solving it but one of managing it," said Mr Dave De Walt, chief executive of McAfee.

Well Mr De Walt, OtherInbox hasn't given up yet.

Comments

Given the perniciousness of spam as a payload vector for infection (as underscored by the unbiquity of botnets, which are based almost entirely upon infected home computers) I hardly think that having a desktop layer is optional. Sure, most or all ISPs filter inbound. That doesn't catch it all, not by a longshot.

A filtering company making hay out of the amount of spam is hardly news. A friend who is the CEO of a filtering company told me he was approached by a 'reputable' research firm who told him that he would be assured top spot in a comparison study they would undertake, were he to pay for it.

hi, there is a company called Abaca Technology Corporation and they have build a spam filter based on ReceiverNet technology.ReceiverNet technology characterizes each protected user based on the percentage of spam they receive and then uses those reputations to rate the incoming message flow. I am using Abaca's spam filter in my office and i am getting only one or two spam mails every day.I saw that Abaca's spam filter has 99% efficiency in blocking spam mails and it is a ultimate solution for spam problem.Download the Osterman Research white paper from this link http://abaca.com/downloads/A%20New%20Approach%20to%20Defeating%20Spam.pdf for more information.

I'm guessing you work for Abaca. 99% is pretty crappy for a spam filter.