'Bug' in new UITS Webmail filter causes some to miss e-mails

Senior Ben Atkinson expected to receive two e-mails last week from professors at the University of British Columbia who said they would revise his honors thesis. However, the messages never made it to his IU Webmail inbox. \nAfter two days of waiting, Atkinson heard from a friend that the new spam filter University Information Technology Services implemented Oct. 17 was sending legitimate e-mails to spam folders. Atkinson discovered that the messages he was waiting for had been automatically sent to his spam folder earlier that week. \n"It was annoying because I only had one day to revise my thesis and prepare for my presentation instead of an entire week like I had planned," Atkinson said. \nAtkinson said he was lucky to check his spam folder that day because the filter by default deletes messages in the spam folder after five days. \nA glitch in the new Webmail spam filter routed an unknown number of students' and faculty's legitimate e-mails to their spam folders. . Several students told the Indiana Daily Student that they missed appointments or meetings because of the error. \nMichael Lucas, director of telecommunications operations and systems at UITS in Indianapolis, said his organization is aware that some legitimate e-mails have ended up in individuals' spam folders, and some spam has ended up in inboxes. \nAfter the IDS interviewed Lucas, UITS posted a notice on the Webmail login screen warning users that e-mail in the spam filters will be deleted after five days.\nTwo problems occurred simultaneously to make this situation worse, Lucas said.\n"First, even though testing was done with about 300 test users, a bug existed in the way the mail relays, and the different e-mail systems communicated whether e-mail was spam or not," he said. "This bug was detected right after the new system was brought into production and additional software was applied to correct that problem."\nThough UITS said the problem has been solved, some students have said there are still defects in the system. Junior Christena Wentz said she sent e-mails Monday night from her AOL account to three other students' IU Webmail addresses for a group project they are working on; however, she said she found out Tuesday that none had received the message because it was forwarded to their spam folder, they told her. \nThe second problem Lucas said they are dealing with is that spammers found a new way to keep the detection software from recognizing spam, and therefore, a lot of junk mail was sent to inboxes. \nSeveral other students have said they have been the victim of UITS's spam bug. Junior Heather Adduci said she was unable to attend a group meeting with other students from class because the notification e-mail for the meeting that was sent beforehand ended up in her spam folder. Senior Jeremiah Ashe said he missed an advising meeting last week because he did not receive his adviser's e-mails. \nLike Ashe, senior Carissa Wheeler said she missed a meeting with her adviser last week because e-mails from the adviser were sent to her spam folder.\n"The e-mails were from an IU e-mail address, which means that the filter blocked e-mails from an IU professor," Wheeler said. \nThe UITS Knowledge Base Web site says that e-mails sent between IU e-mail addresses aren't supposed to be filtered.\nSid Stamm, a graduate student and computer security researcher for IU, offered some suggestions to users about malfunctioning spam filters. \n"Don't perform important transactions (such as soliciting job interview times) via e-mail," Stamm said. "It's estimated that 84 percent of e-mail is spam; it seems all too easy to lose important e-mails."\nStamm also encouraged users to check their spam folder at least once a day. \n"Let me start off by pointing out that spam filters are not perfect, not even close," he said. "This is very important to know and users should check their spam folders once a day or so. ... With better luck, spam will become less of a problem -- but don't hold your breath."\nLucas said UITS made an effort to notify users of this new filtering system prior to its activation through various mediums, including announcements in the UITS Monitor weekly newsletter sent by e-mail to subscribers and an article published on IU Home Pages. \n"I stress the importance of reading and understanding the change communications that UITS sends out prior to any large change like this," he said.\nLucas said UITS has worked to correct the problems with the spam filter. \n"I apologize for the problems that Ben (Atkinson) and others have had with their legitimate e-mail being routed to the spam folder," he said. "I hope that we have identified all of the bugs in the system and that this will not occur again." \nLucas also said users experiencing problems with the spam filter should contact the UITS Support Center. Users can call 855-6789 for 24-hour phone support or send e-mail concerns to iuhelp@iu.edu.