Top Dog features information on eight different categories of email.
In addition to the usual spam identification Top Dog gives you access to Apocgraphy's proprietary database which contains information on thousands of common email.
Top Dog will flag incoming email as belonging to these categories allowing you to automatically sort or screen these email as you see fit.
This database is continually updated by Apocgraphy staff and by users like you.
Categories include:
These are electronic versions of the old fashioned chain letters. They usually offer the promise of good luck to all who forward them and horrible consequences to those who "break the chain"
Any message that asks you to
forward it on and/or email someone to further a cause.
The cause it self may be legitimate/worthwhile or not.
A message being placed in this category is not a reflection on the legitimacy
of the cause.
Urban legends are apocryphal
stories, that spread quickly and are popularly believed to be true though
generally not true or highly exaggerated.
These email are usually
cautionary tails about HIV infected needles being placed in pay phones
and the like.
They are hoaxes of a sort but they are usually quite involved and are usually sent with the good intention of warning the recipient about some danger to themselves or their loved ones.
Note: Some Urban
Legends are true.
For example the UN
Hunger Site legend or Make
the Pie Higher! legend.
This category includes any
mass mailing that you would like to receive.
Top Dog features full
support for mailing lists.
Top Dog will screen out all mass mailings which are normally spam, unless
you indicate that you would like to receive them.
It is often difficult to say whether or not a message is spam since the same message sent to someone who has asked to receive it versus someone who has not will change this determination. One useful strategy for eliminating spam is to screen all bulk mailings that are not in your personal list of approved senders or known mailing lists.
Many spammers will try to tell you they are a legitimate mailing list and they have added you to their list because they thought you would be interested.
Legitimate mailing lists will only put you on the list if you specifically ask to be put on it, and will drop you from the list at your request.
If you have not requested to be put on a list please categorize all their email as commercial spam.
Opt-out mailing lists also
belong in the commercial spam category.
Web sites frequently have you uncheck a box if you do not want
to be added to a mailing list. This practice is one form of opt-out list.
The best practice for running
mailing lists is known as double opt-in. This is where you specifically
request to be added to a mailing list and then the mailing list sends
you a one-time confirmation email and only adds you to their list after
you have confirmed your request.
If this has not happened the email probably does not belong in this category.
This form of message is usually some sort of bogus warning that encourages you to forward it on to all your friends or a scam which uses fraudulent claims in an attempt to get money from you.
This category is a sort of catch-all for any bogus message that does not fall into one of the other categories of bogus message.
Bogus virus warnings and scams are examples of this category of message.
Further information on scam hoaxes can be found at
the following sites:
Further information on virus hoaxes can be found at the following sites:
This category is pretty self explanatory.
Email in this category make their rounds of the internet usually forwarded between friends.
Their content is intended to be funny and they generally don't ask you to forward them on.
It is nice to categorize email as Jokes even though they are not malicious in any way, simply to help people avoid mistaking them as spam.
This category includes all
viruses, worms, and Trojan horses.
They are the sort of thing virus scanners scan for.
If your virus scanner goes
off when you receive an email you are strongly encouraged to flag
the attachment as a virus.
This will be a valuable warning to those people who are not running a
virus checker, have out dated virus definition files or a less sensitive
virus scanner.
This category includes any
email you did not specially request or authorize be sent to you.
The usually contain get rich quick schemes, offers of pornography or any
other advertisement for products or services which you did not solicit.
This category is often called Unsolicited Commercial email or UCE and constitutes the bulk of unwanted email.
Although the offers may be dubious, if the message is offering outright to sell you something then it should be considered commercial spam as opposed to a hoax.
If a message was forwarded to you by a friend it probably does not belong in this category.