With an influx of spam and spyware popping up on today's laptops and personal computers, many believe keeping up with the filtration of these infectious nuisances should not be a concern in the first place.
The UA's Center for Computing and Information Technology does its best to help ensure unsolicited spam and bulk messages do not reach the more than 50,000 students, faculty and staff using UA's WebMail program, said Michael Torregrossa, co-director of CCIT.
Torregrossa said between 30 and 50 percent of more than one million daily messages it processes are spam. He said CCIT does its best to filter out unwanted spam or bulk email messages, but they are "always playing catch up" in weeding out such emails.
CCIT tries to curtail the problem with its subscription to a spam blocking service called Spam Assassin. The anti-spam program helps recognize keywords and phrases that recur in most unsolicited spam emails, and lists updates to help CCIT counter such attacks.
Spam emails include offers to buy pornographic merchandise, mortgage offers and pharmaceutical products, among others, which are hard to consistently block, Torregrossa said.
"Spammers are clever and manage to find ways to get messages through to users," Torregrossa said. "It's a huge problem with all email accounts."
Torregrossa said his best advice is telling students to not give out personal and credit card information and to not sign up on Web sites or listservs that seem skewed. CCIT also sends out a message to users who have just opened a UA WebMail account showing them how to setup spam blocking protection, Torregrossa said.
While some users who open their email see their fair share of spam, others are luckier. But Torregrossa said it always comes back in some manner.
"It's hard to discern any certain pattern, but CCIT is always bombarded with spam that we try our best to filter. Some are just lucky to get through," said Torregrossa, adding that spammers make up user names tagged onto email.arizona.edu users hoping to get at least a few hits which they consider a success.
Katie Alter, a senior majoring in English and creative writing, said she now just checks her email every other day, knowing she'll have a full page of spam before getting to any real email messages. She said she's been getting a lot more recently but said she always deletes them rather than opening her computer up to viruses.
"It would be nice if CCIT could find a way to filter emails better," said Alter, adding the blocking of spam messages would be easier to figure out if CCIT instructed students better on how to do it.
Torregrossa said CCIT allows students to change their Net ID and email address if spam is overtaking their computer, but said he shows these users ways to avoid obtaining spam with programs like Spam Assassin and a help desk on the main login page, which can block spam messages with a click of a button, before rushing to get a new email address.
"Most people realize spam is a reality you have to deal with," Torregrossa said. "We're trying our best to stop it."