Upcoming Change in Notre Dame’s Spam Defense Strategy
Posted: August 1, 2007
The Notre Dame e-mail servers receive over one million messages every day with over 90% of these messages identified as spam. A spam firewall allows ND to more effectively use e-mail as a productive communications tool by keeping these unsolicited messages from reaching our inboxes. For the last 2 years, the Barracuda Spam appliance developed by Barracuda Network Systems has served the campus well by blocking a vast majority of e-mail spam sent to campus users.
Over the last 7-8 months, however, on-going performance problems with the Barracuda and the inability by the company to provide stable support suggest that it may no longer be a viable strategy for us to rely on going forward. The OIT launched an analysis this summer to evaluate alternative solutions and have narrowed the list to three very viable technologies and companies.
In the meantime, a recent code upgrade and patch released by the company to address chronic performance problems have introduced new issues including rare instances of loss of e-mail messages. The OIT considers loss of e-mail as an unacceptable condition. Turning off the spam appliance is not an option as campus users would see a 10-fold increase in the amount of spam delivered to their inbox. While the OIT continues to press the vendor to resolve and prevent these problems, it is now clear that a replacement strategy must be executed sooner than later. Quite simply, the campus can not afford to suffer any disruption to e-mail during the hectic and critical back-to-school period.
To this end, the OIT will accelerate the Barracuda replacement and look to implement the new solution BEFORE the start of the fall semester. This means a considerable shortening of the normal project execution and change management process. Our goal is to make this transition as smooth and seamless as possible and, other than change away from the Barracuda user-interface to something new, should go largely unnoticed by the campus.
In the coming days, the OIT will work with various campus constituents and support groups to begin the project. Details will be posted on the OIT web site at oit.nd.edu/email.
If you have additional questions about e-mail or spam, please contact your departmental IT support staff or the OIT Help Desk at 574-631-8111.