GILROY
– City Hall is sending out more than 1,000 e-mails as part of an
effort to rid itself of pesky spam messages that clog
computers.
GILROY – City Hall is sending out more than 1,000 e-mails as part of an effort to rid itself of pesky spam messages that clog computers.
The city has installed and is testing anti-spam software on its e-mail servers. During testing, the software must “learn” what e-mail should be allowed into the system. This is done by monitoring what addresses outside the city are being sent mail by employees.
“It looks only at the e-mail addresses and not at the subject or content of the e-mails,” a statement from City Hall reads.
The software needs to have at least 1,000 e-mails sent to begin filtering spam. City Hall spokesman Joe Kline did not have a firm date for when the testing would be completed.
“It has to go through a learning curve and it’s only a week in,” Kline said. “But it’s installed now and an evaluation will happen soon.”
Kline said he is likely the biggest spam victim at City Hall. As the city’s Web site manager, he receives at least 15 to 20 junk e-mails a day.
“I’d assume that the other employees get less than that, but we all get them,” Kline said.
Although worker productivity increases only nominally when spam mail is purged from users e-mail programs, a spamless city network has many other benefits.
Workers will spend less time deleting – or reading – junk e-mail the more it is void of their computers. And e-mail programs will operate more fluidly with less mail clogging inboxes.
Also, viruses are typically spread via junk e-mail. So with less spam, the chances of the city’s computer system getting infected with a complex and costly virus will diminish.
