New Mail Filters for Macs, Older AOL Versions

America Online is rolling out new
anti-spam battle axes for users of Mac OS/X and older
AOL versions such as 8.0, 7.0 and 6.0, in what the ISP
calls a second line of defense against the daily
onslaught of spam.

AOL officials said the upgraded filters enable
users to deploy techniques such as receiving mail only
from folks in members’ address books or filtering by
keywords. Offered server-side, the latest filters are
also more intuitive and adaptive for members and need
no additional upgrade or installation.

The new filtering techniques for prior versions of
AOL and Mac users were previously only available to
members using the more recent AOL for Broadband and
AOL 9.0 Optimized, the latest client that is slated to
move into retail and wider distribution in October.

The ISP counts about 2.4 billion pieces of junk
e-mail that it blocks for members each day, helped in
large part by versions 8.0, 8.0 Plus and AOL 9.0,
which deploy “Report Spam” features that help AOL
members flag e-mail for AOL to block on its own
servers before they hit members’ inboxes. The upgrade
also includes a Spam Folder where unwanted mail is
automatically routed to cull spam from a member’s
regular incoming e-mail.

The latest filters are also more adaptive as
members use them and update in real-time with each new
block of junk that tries to find its way into the
users’ inboxes.

David Gang, executive vice president of AOL
Products, said the automatic delivery of the newer
filters would be seamless to members using earlier
versions of the AOL software for Windows or AOL for
Mac OS X.

The filters will be rolling out to older versions
of the AOL client, such as 7.0 and 6.0, in the coming
months, AOL added.

The upgrade comes a few months after a petition that
more than one million AOL subscribers signed
electronically, which called on state and federal
officials to pass laws that crack down on fraudulent
and offensive junk e-mail.