What is Barracuda?

Email-Forwarding-For-Life

What is Barracuda?

Barracuda is an anti-spam solution, selected by Wake Forest to prevent unsolicited email messages from being passed through the Email Forwarding For Life (EFFL) service.

What does Barracuda do?

At its most basic, Barracuda simply blocks messages that are most obviously spam and delivers those that are obviously not spam.

If an EFFL user wants or needs more spam filtering, they can increase their level of filtering by logging into the Barracuda device and enabling a higher level of filtering.

For those who may need more filtering, you can set your Barracuda spam filter to rate the likelihood that a message is spam and act one of the four ways:

1. Delivers legitimate email to your inbox
2. "Tags" a suspicious message as possibly spam and delivers it to your inbox.
3. "Quarantines" highly suspicious email into a separate quarantine folder (that you are able to access and review)
4. Blocks email that is definitely spam (these messages are discarded and irretrievable)

We have set the spam blocker filter to block the obvious spam. You will still be able to access any mail in the Quarantine folder (so you can review it and ensure intended mail was not blocked). You can also customize your own personal settings to make the spam filter tag, quarantine, or block more suspicious emails if you wish.

Please note that Quarantined messages older than 30 days are permanently deleted.

How does an EFFL user increase the level of filtering?

If the default settings are not adequate to reduce your spam problem, Barracuda allows users to customize the level of filtering to meet your needs. As mentioned above, an advanced filter setup in Barracuda does one of four things based on likelihood of spam: delivers the message, tags and delivers, quarantines and stores, or blocks the message.

To increase your level of filtering, you will need to access Barracuda » Once you have logged in successfully, click on "Preferences" and then "Spam Settings"

• Under Spam Scoring, change "Use System Defaults" from "yes" to "no". Save Changes.
• You can now modify the scores. Volunteer test members found that the following worked well:
  • Tag Score = 2
  • Quarantine Score = 4
  • Block Score = 6
• Don't forget to Save Changes!
• You will likely need to adjust the scoring system several times to meet your unique needs.

If you don't understand the scoring system, read on.

Using the scoring system to increase filtering.

Using the settings mentioned just above, if a message is scored as less than 2, Barracuda will deliver the message normally.  If the message scores greater than 2 but less than 4, tag the message subject line so that the users knows Barracuda has suspicions, but deliver it anyway.  If the message scores between and 4 and 6, quarantine the message in the Barracuda system.  If the message scores 6+, block the message entirely.

You can access your Barracuda account by logging into Barracuda using the following link. Access Barracuda »

If you do not recall your password, please input your EFFL address (your "WIN ID"@alumni.wfu.edu) and click "Create New Password" at the bottom. An email will be sent via your EFFL to you shortly.

Please note that only active EFFL users can have a password sent to them. If your EFFL is not active (is not forwarding mail anywhere) then you will not have a Barracuda account and you will not have a way to receive a password. To reactivate your EFFL address,

• log into WIN
• click on Personal
• click on Maintain Email Forwarding.
• input a new forwarding address

Forgotten WIN password? Click here for help.

If you choose to increase the filtering offered by Barracuda, you will have a Quarantine folder in your Barracuda settings that contain messages which scored between your personalized tag and quarantine score settings. These messages are stored in Barracuda, and can be accessed by logging into Barracuda. Access Barracuda »

You can do the following with Quarantined messages. To complete one of the following, check the white box to the left of the message in the Quarantine queue and select one of the following options:

• Deliver - delivers the message
• Whitelist - delivers the message and denotes that the sender is to always be trusted
• Whitelist/Not Spam - same as Whitelist, but also teaches your Barracuda setting that messages similar to this are not spam.
• Delete - deletes the message
• Classify as Spam - teaches your Barracuda settings that messages similar are spam
• Classify as Not Spam - teaches your Barracuda settings that similar messages are not spam.

You may change the frequency of emails alerting you to messages in your Quarantine folder, by clicking on "Preferences" and then modifying "Notification Interval." Barracuda will then alert you, based on desired frequency, of the messages queued in Quarantine. These alerts will be sent to you from Wake Forest University EFFL Spam Filter and the subject line will be User Quarantine Account Information.

Please note that Quarantined messages older than 30 days are permanently deleted.

Barracuda also looks for viral attachments and will remove any attachments containing a virus. You will be notified if an attachment is removed from your message.

To disable all filtering, you will need to access Barracuda » Once you have logged in successfully, click on "Preferences" and then "Spam Settings." Set all scoring levels to "10" and click "save changes."

Please note that this will disable all spam filtering and potentially increase the amount of annoying spam messages.