I noticed that a number of messages to the users list have been marked
with [Spam] in the subjects since the list migration. This appears to
be due to the Spamassassin settings on bastion. I think this subject
munging is undesirable and would like to see it stopped. Having
legitimate messages sent to list members tagged as [SPAM] serves no
good purpose. If I were a list member I might wonder why my message
was marked or why Fedora is forwarding on mail it thinks is spam.
At the same time, it's worth noting that if the SpamAssassin settings
are marking legitimate list mail as spam, they probably ought to be
tweaked a bit. If these messages had gone through bastion before
hitting Mailman and were to a list with a rule to reject or discard on
X-Spam-Flag (as I know several lists do, websites being one example),
the messages would have been improperly discarded.
This isn't to say I don't appreciate the job that SpamAssassin does
nor the hard work put in by Warren and others upstream. I just want
to ensure that SpamAssassin does not act too aggressively at marking
up the mail that comes through
fedoraproject.org.
I've attached an example of a recent users list message which was
marked as spam improperly. The relevant SpamAssassin headers:
X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.3.0 (2010-01-18) on
bastion2.fedora.phx.redhat.com
X-Spam-Flag: YES
X-Spam-Level: *****
X-Spam-Status: Yes, score=5.6 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_50,SPOOF_COM2COM,
SPOOF_COM2OTH autolearn=no version=3.3.0
X-Spam-Report: * 2.7 SPOOF_COM2OTH URI: URI contains ".com" in middle * 2.0
SPOOF_COM2COM URI: URI contains ".com" in middle and end * 0.8 BAYES_50
BODY: Bayes spam probability is 40 to 60% * [score: 0.5000]
--
Todd OpenPGP -> KeyID: 0xBEAF0CE3 | URL:
www.pobox.com/~tmz/pgp
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Life is like a sewer. What you get out of it depends on what you put
into it.
-- Tom Lehrer, quoting Henry