Spam - VM's filter is useless!

[timbo42]

I'm so sick & tired of VM's utterly useless Spam filter! VM is happy to allow any messages about Viagra, Bitcoin scams, phishing attacks through, but blocks many real e-mails! I've had 20 scam e-mails in the last 3 days trying to get me to renew Norton anti-virus (which I don't have). I mark them as Spam each time, but the system never learns!

As I said the system also blocks proper e-mails sometimes - e-mails from a Dutch company I deal with are always blocked, no matter how many times I mark them as not Spam. I even had an individual e-mail from a UK company acknowledging an order classed as spam.

Its useless, and its always been useless, and it never gets better! I wouldn't mind if the system ever learnt - isn't that what modern sophisticated systems are supposed to do???

[SH3user]

Had none for 3 days now! I feel abandoned;-)

[burton22276]

Hi,

I've had issues within the last two weeks. Inundated with scam emails from bitcoin, Norton, and Mcafee - report as spam- still get them - - now I'm blacklisting them on virgin website -  if I access email through google mail for example I find I can't blacklist emails there - login to virgin email through their website - select email and there's three lines on the right, right at the bottom of the list "blacklist sender" and that blocks that email address from coming through again, I'm blocking about 10 a day - the email changes every time.

[timbo42]

You're lucky not to have any in the last 3 days! For me, the flood does seem to have subsided to a trickle in the last few hours.

[ALF28]

the virgin email  does not have  Bayesian spam filtering or machine learning using AI to identify/block spam  that dedicated email services from large companies such as google and Microsoft. 

I have been getting the antivirus renewal spams most days, and general spam for many years. Virgin do tag many emails as spam but have not picked up on the fake antivirus/security spam emails such as Norton

There is a danger some customers may think the emails are genuine and interact giving details to the spammer.

I try to filter them out using the filters in settings and manage to block most of them that way.

The best advice is always to log onto the genuine website to check any renewals by logging into your own account rather than click on what may be a fake email and website, I assume all emails could be fake and never click on any links. download or attachments unless I recognise the email as genuine or from a known person/company.

Older virgin email addresses like  ntlworld.com seem to be prone to spam, I have many emails with other companies that get almost no spam.

Virgin can not control who sends emails but the spam filters should be improved perhaps.

[timbo42]

My flood of spam seems to have ceased for now! Its ceased - ie not sent, not that its being detected as Spam by Virgin. The only new thing in my Spam folder was a perfectly good e-mail from a company I buy things from, which Virgin always marks as Spam, no matter how I often I mark it as 'Not Spam'

[timbo42]

Spoke too soon! Another 5 in the last 3 hours! So annoying....

[ALF28]

spam -FLOODING IN

Antivirus Update Available! To Prevent Recent Malware and Viruses Please Update Now     today    macafee

Your Device is Infected with (5) Dangerous VIRUSES!       today

Activate your Norton Anti-Virus Protection - please respond!     yesterday 

Wanna be perfect in da bed? We have a solution!            yesterday    canada pharmacy  (tagged as spam)

Your Protection Has Expired!   yesterday

Subscription Information    wednesday

Important: Your account balance has already increased to £ 18,514 (check now)  bitcoin 15/11/20  (get lots of these)

Last Reminder #294147688-2627    wednesday

we are not responsible if you are hacked after the expiration date -   yesterday

Your license has expired today - Last call             thursday

Your license has-expired renew quickly    6/11/20

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

just a few examples of recent spam that gets through, only one tagged as spam-canada pharmacy

The spam filters do not pickup that the emails are spoofed and the sender address does not match the source address, this is so each email is different, I think there is more than one spammer at work, emails from many sources so hard to stop them.

I have been getting spam since 2016 and it is not possible to stop this, other than setting up a new email which only takes 5 minutes, I ditched my spammed email but it is still my virgin primary email attached to my account and can not be removed or replaced so I monitor it as there so many cases of hacked emails reported on these posts, so I keep it active and secure and filter the spam.

[ALF28]

the spam issue has been posted in other place also

see  Daily Spam re Norton/Mcafee - Virgin Media Community - 4501578

Looks like virgin may be looking at the problem in these other posts

[ALF28]

also see 

Re: Anti-virus phishing - Virgin Media Community - 4524856

[timbo42]

These e-mails still coming through. Their actual content seems more & more ridiculous as time goes on. Perhaps we should be grateful that whilst they seem very clever technically to avoid all the processes to stop them, they are actually clueless as criminals!