Spam

At StartMail, we understand that you want to receive as little spam as possible. That is why we go to great lengths to achieve this.

Our spam filter has the ability to deal with excessive and varied spam. However, unlike the spam filters of other email services which read and analyze the spam behavior of all its users, it takes time for our Bayesian filtering technology to learn your preferences to determine which of your emails are spam and which are not.

We protect your spam filter training data with the same confidentiality and security that we apply to your emails. It is stored encrypted in your User Vault, and we do not share any of our users' spam training information.

For us to learn the desired filtering algorithm for an individual StartMail user, this requires the user to continue to mark messages as spam (or not spam), so that the user's filter learning mechanism can "kick in" for emails to go to the proper place.

We endeavor to balance spam filtering and your privacy together as we learn your filtering algorithm.

Whether or not an email is officially marked as spam by our system is displayed in the email header.

• Tips to prevent receiving spam
• Block sender
• Mark message as spam
• Mark message as not spam
• Delete all messages in the Spam folder

Tips to prevent receiving spam

1. Always avoid using your real email address when signing up for online accounts. Use a StartMail alias instead. If your alias is being spammed, simply delete or turn off the alias in order to stop the spam from reaching your inbox. Please visit this article for more information on creating aliases.
   
   
2. Avoid exposing your main email address on public websites or social media, or in documents that are freely accessible on the Web.
   
   
3. Unsubscribe from unwanted newsletters, etc. Legally, all unsolicited emails are required to have an unsubscribe option (usually at the bottom of the email), but illegal spammers will probably not abide by the law. Legitimate unsubscribe links will already know your email address so you won’t need to fill it in. If an unsubscribe link asks for your email address, do not type it in as this may cause the spammer to send you even more Spam.
   
   
4. For your protection, NEVER open an email from unknown senders, suspicious sources, or when you are not expecting to receive an email attachment.
   
   
5. In the email header, you may also see a link under List-Unsubscribe which may contain an email address for unsubscribing.
   
   
6. You may be able to report the spammer to abuse@thespammersdomain, but if the spammer owns the domain, this will not help.
   
   

   Block sender

   Do you often receive unwanted emails from a certain sender and unsubscribing from their newsletter list has not been successful? Then use this function to create a filter with just one click. It deletes future incoming emails directly, without it going to your trash folder.
   
   

   1. Click on the email whose sender you want to delete directly from your inbox.
      
      
   2. Click on the three dots and select Block this sender.
      
      
   3. Click Block and a filter will be created that will immediately delete the unwanted email in the future.
      
      
      
      
   4. If you want to remove the filter at a later time, find the created filter under Settings > Filters and click Remove within the filter.
      
      

Mark message as spam

• Select the message(s) that you want to mark as Spam and click on the circle with a line icon.
  
  

Mark message as not spam

Of course, emails can also end up in your spam folder by mistake. If this happens, we recommend that you create a contact for the sender or write back to them to add them to your recipient list. This will significantly reduce the risk of any future emails from the sender ending up in your Spam folder.

If creating the contact or adding it to the recipient list is not sufficient, please first open the spam folder and place a tick again in front of the e-mail whose marking you now want to unmark. Then click on the thumbs-up button to mark the e-mail as not spam.

Delete all messages in the Spam folder

1. Go to your Spam folder to select either Delete All messages or to select individual emails.
2. To Delete All emails, click the blue Delete All button (with trash folder icon). All email check boxes will be highlighted in blue with a white check mark.
3. To delete individual emails, click on the check box by the individual emails and select the Trash icon in the white bar.
   
   
   
   
4. Emails are now deleted from your Spam folder and moved into your Trash folder.
   
   
   
   
5.  To delete all items in your Trash folder, click on the blue Delete All button. To delete only selected emails, click on the check box next to the emails and click on the trash can icon in the white bar.
   
   
   
   
6. As a final warning/reminder, you will see the message below. Once you click the red Delete Messages button, there is no way to retrieve your deleted emails.