Reflexion Network Solutions this week is scheduled to release an upgrade to its anti-spam hosted service based on the company's belief that multiple
e-mail addresses are better than one.
Total Control 4.0 combines traditional anti-spam tactics, such as whitelisting and content filtering, with an unusual approach
to fighting spam. The service lets an unlimited number of e-mail addresses be associated with each user's primary e-mail in-box,
so that users can control who has access to their e-mail address and discover when their addresses have been shared without
authorization, says Reflexion CEO David Hughes.
The company calls this fractionated in-box access. Each Total Control user has a primary e-mail address; when a new contact
tries to reach the user at that address, a response is automatically generated asking the contact to resend to a slightly
different address. The idea is that legitimate senders will resend, while spammers, who often use automated scripts to send
unwanted e-mail, will not. This is similar to the way challenge-response programs work, such as those from Sendio and CA.
Total Control goes beyond confirming senders are who they say they are by coupling the new contact's e-mail address with the
appropriate supplemental e-mail address of the service's user; whenever a third party sends e-mail to that supplemental address
the user knows his e-mail address has been shared, and can determine whether or not such action was authorized.
Total Control creates supplemental addresses and resolves them to the primary in-box, so it is transparent to users and system
administrators, Hughes says.
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