Filter out based on URL

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EmileB
Posts: 12
Joined: October 23rd, 2021, 2:58 pm

Filter out based on URL

Post by EmileB »

Most of the spam emails I receive, contain buttons that link to a URL which is usually (but not always) revealed by hovering the mouse cursor over it. Is there a way to filter such emails to spam if such a URL contains certain text such as "amazonaws.com" ? I'm not a power user so please forgive me if this is a stupid question :oops: .
Thanks,
Emile.
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tanstaafl
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Posts: 49647
Joined: July 30th, 2003, 5:06 pm

Re: Filter out based on URL

Post by tanstaafl »

The junk mail controls don't let you do that. You could create a message filter that tests whether the body of a message contains that string. The problem is that lots of legitimate messages (especially newsletters and messages from companies you do business with) might have a link to a remote image hosted by that service. Its extremely popular.

The best way to minimize spam is to use a email provider that uses sophisticated software such as SpamAssassin or Rspamd to detect spam on the server, before it gets to you. Gmail uses their own spam detection software (they spent over $50 million buying companies to provide that for them) but is the gold standard. I would have low expectations if you use outlook.com, yahoo.com, aol.com or your ISP as your email provider.

Plus addressing is widely supported though there are still some email providers that don't support it. The idea is to give each company/web site a unique address that is easy to block if you get spam from them. Rather than providing your normal email address (username@domain.tld) you just choose a word and add it to the address using this format: username+whateveryoulike@domain.tld

If somebody sends a email to that address it still goes to your normal mailbox. But now you have something unique that you can test using a message filter to block any mail sent to that address, if it gets abused. Using plus addressing won't protect you from any spammers that already send spam to your email address, but it helps keep the situation from getting worse. Plus addressing is officially called subaddressing .

https://www.fastmail.help/hc/en-us/arti ... addressing
EmileB
Posts: 12
Joined: October 23rd, 2021, 2:58 pm

Re: Filter out based on URL

Post by EmileB »

Many thanks for your extensive explanation 8-) Looks like the easiest is to just put up with it and be watchful.
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