I use domain-based (rather than free ISP such as Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo) email very heavily and like millions of other users, I have been inundated with spam for a long time as some of my long running email addresses have been posted on web pages.

I have been using Thunderbird since the last two years in an attempt to control it. Plus, I followed the usual precautions about not using the preview pane, not replying, not unsubscribing and not opening etc. All this worked reasonably well (Thunderbird has excellent junk mail controls- you just train the software initially and it picks up from there), but there was not letup to the constant barrage of spam. It was not unusual to receive 20-30 emails a day.

Enabling Box Trapper
As I didn't have the time to upgrade Thunderbird from 0.9 to the latest version, I decided to use the tools my hosting company offers- Spam Assasin and Box Trapper. I enabled Box Trapper for the email addresses that received the most spam emails and for good measure, enabled Spam Assasin too (not sure at this stage whether Box trapper would work without SA enabled).

How does Box Trapper work
Once Box Trapper is enabled, especially with the 'Automatic Whitelisting' option turned OFF, it means ONLY mails sent from addresses in your whitelist will get through to your inbox; all the rest will be trapped and sent to a review queue.

Dramatic reduction in spam
The results? A dramatic reduction in spam. It is only about 10 hours since I enabled it, but I have not received a single spam email in that time. Curious, I looked at the Box Trapper queue in my account's control panel and there were three spam mails each for both the email addresses for which I had enabled Box Trapper.

Box Trapper zaps spam emails

There are still some issues I have to figure out with Box Trapper- I will try and post a short tutorial some day.

So, if you rely on domain-based email and have a hosting account, check out your ISP's email management tools, particularly, Spam Assassin and Box Trapper. Used in conjunction with an email client like Thunderbird, your daily spam count could almost reach zero. Of course, I realise it is early days yet, but I think I have found a way to stay relatively spam free.

Other Resources
If you use free email (Yahoo!, Hotmail etc.), check out
MailWasher- I have not used it but heard it does a good job. I have found Gmail to have excellent spam filters, so you can generally let it handle the problem.

I also found Brian Livingston's ebook on spam proofing to be an excellent resource. I purchased it for $9.95. I heartily recommend it.