Yahoo has taken new steps to sharpen its Webmail service's antispam capabilities, including the adoption of two commercial technologies and the testing of an open-source system, the company said Tuesday.

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Abaca announced that Yahoo will use its e-mail security technology designed to detect malicious phishing and spam messages and filter them out of Yahoo Mail in-boxes.

Meanwhile, Return Path said separately that Yahoo will implement its Complaint Feedback Loop, a service that notifies legitimate e-mail marketers whenever end users tag their messages as spam, so that they can investigate why, such as using an incorrect mailing list, and take corrective action.

Finally, Yahoo announced that its internal antispam team has been using a "supercomputer" grid made up of thousands of PCs to improve its ability to detect spammers. Yahoo is working with universities in this research effort, whose PC grid is part of the company's open source Hadoop project.

In a blog posting announcing the various efforts, Yahoo's Anti-Spam Czar Mark Risher wrote that fighting spam continues to be a huge challenge and priority for the company. "The bad guys are always out there trying to make a buck with their scams, but we're committed to helping keep you safer online," Risher said.

The IDG News Service is a Network World affiliate.