In the never ending fight against Spam there are a few programs that can help. This how-to is here to work with my how-to's on SpamAssassin. It tells you how to add on more features to SpamAssassin to help block spam.

Name: Rules Du Jour
HomePage: http://www.rulesemporium.com/
Function: RulesDuJour is a bash script intended to automatically download new versions of SpamAssassin rulesets as the authors release new versions.

Name: DCC (Distributed Checksum Clearinghouse)
HomePage: http://www.rhyolite.com/anti-spam/dcc/
Function: Distributed Checksum Clearinghouse is an anti-spam content filter.

Name: Razor
HomePage: http://razor.sourceforge.net/
Function: Vipul's Razor is a distributed, collaborative, spam detection and filtering network.

Name: Pyzor
HomePage: http://pyzor.sourceforge.net/
Function: Pyzor is a collaborative, networked system to detect and block spam using identifying digests of messages.

click here to setup Rules Du Jour

click here to go to DCC

click here to install Razor

click here to configure Pyzor

click here to read Information on checksumming image spam

click here to read Information on DCC License

click here to read Information on the Razor License

Rules Du Jour

1. Firstly make sure you have SpamAssassin setup and working with one of the following how-to's

http://www.opensourcehowto.org/how-to/postfix/postfix-spamassassin-procmail...squirrelmail.html

http://www.opensourcehowto.org/how-to/procmail/winbind...spamassassin...dovecot.html

2. Now lets get Rules Du Jour updating everyday and working with SpamAssassin.

3. Download the Rules Du Jour script

http://sandgnat.com/rdj/rules_du_jour

4. put it in /usr/local/bin

cp  rules_du_jour /usr/local/bin/

5. Make the Rules Du Jour directory.

mkdir /etc/rulesdujour

6. Create the Rules Du Jour configuration file at /etc/rulesdujour/config

nano /etc/rulesdujour/config

7. Now set cron to run the script when ever you want

crontab -e

28 4 * * * /usr/local/bin/rules_du_jour

8. There are a list of the rules that can be used and a brief explaination here, just add them in the /etc/rulesdujour/config file after the TRUSTED_RULESETS="RULES" and leave a space between each one.

http://www.psoft.net/HSdocumentation/sysadmin/rulesdujour.html

9. Now run the script for the first time.

/usr/local/bin/rules_du_jour

10. Once you have sorted that out just restart SpamAssassin

/etc/init.d/spamassassin restart

11. You'll notice all new files in your /etc/mail/spamassassin folder ending in .cf SpamAssassin uses all files in that folder ending in .cf  as it's configuration files.

DCC

1. Now it's time to setup dcc (Distributed Checksum Clearinghouse) & Spamassassin

2. download the source from

http://www.rhyolite.com/anti-spam/dcc/

or directly from

http://www.rhyolite.com/anti-spam/dcc/source/dcc.tar.Z

3. Next we unzip it

tar -zxvf dcc.tar.Z

4. Now we install it

./configure
make
make install

5. Once it has installed change the local.cf configuration file

nano /etc/mail/spamassassin/local.cf

6. Once everything is done restart SpamAssassin

/etc/init.d/spamassassin restart

7. Now lets setup the start init file for dcc and set it to start on boot

download the script from here

cp dcc.txt /etc/init.d/dcc

chmod +x /etc/init.d/dcc

chkconfig --add dcc

chkconfig dcc on

/etc/init.d/dcc start

8. edit the /var/dcc/dcc_conf file

nano /var/dcc/dcc_conf 

Find the line that reads:

and change it to:

9. Lets link the cron job to the /usr/bin directory

ln -s /var/dcc/libexec/cron-dccd /usr/bin/cron-dccd

10. Now, we’ll tell cron to run it every morning, at 5:00 am:

crontab -e

0 5 * * * /usr/bin/cron-dccd

11. comming soon ...

Razor

1. Now it's time to setup Razor & Spamassassin, We need to make sure we have the right perl modules installed.

perl -MCPAN -e "install Time::HiRes"
perl -MCPAN -e "install Digest::SHA1"
perl -MCPAN -e "install MIME::Base64"
perl -MCPAN -e "install Test::Simple"
perl -MCPAN -e "install Test::Harness"
perl -MCPAN -e "install Getopt::Long"
perl -MCPAN -e "install File::Copy"
perl -MCPAN -e "install URI::Escape"

2. Firstly we need to download the sdk source from

http://razor.sourceforge.net/

3. Next we need to unzip it

bunzip2 razor-agents-sdk-2.07.tar.bz2
tar -xvf razor-agents-sdk-2.07.tar

4. Now we need to install it

cd razor-agents-sdk-2.07

perl Makefile.PL
make
make test
make install

5. Now it's time to install razor, Download it the source from from

http://razor.sourceforge.net/

6. Now we need to unzip it

bunzip2 razor-agents-2.81.tar.bz2
tar -xvf razor-agents-2.81.tar

7. Now we need to install it

cd razor-agents-2.07

perl Makefile.PL
make
make test
make install

8. Next make a razor user

useradd -d /bin/null -s /bin/bash razor

9. now change into the razor user and

su razor
razor-admin -create
exit

10. Register your Razor install with the Razor servers. Replace the address with your admin’s e-mail address:

razor-admin -register -user= This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it This email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it

11.  comming soon ...

xx. To check that Razor is being used with SpamAssassin run this command.

spamassassin -t -D < /tmp/spam

xx. After that has run it's course check the /tmp/spam file for the following information

 debug: Razor is available
 debug: Razor Agents 1.20, protocol version 2.
 debug: Read server list from /home/jgb/.razor.lst
 debug: 72636 seconds before closest server discovery
 debug: Closest server is 209.204.62.150
 debug: Connecting to 209.204.62.150...
 debug: Connection established
 debug: Signature: 48e74b8496877ba45072b201b41eebed7038186b
 debug: Server version: 1.11, protocol version 2
 debug: Server response: Negative
 48e74b8496877ba45072b201b41eebed7038186b
 debug: Message 1 NOT found in the catalogue.

Pyzor

1. Now it's time to setup Pyzor & Spamassassin, Firstly make sure you have python installed

2. Firstly we Need to download the sdk source from

http://pyzor.sourceforge.net/

3. Now we need to unzip it

bunzip2 pyzor-0.4.0.tar.bz2
tar -xvf  pyzor-0.4.0.tar

4. Now we need to install it

cd pyzor-0.4.0

python setup.py build
python setup.py install

5. The install may mess up some of the permissions. We can fix it by issuing this command:

chmod -R a+rx /usr/share/doc/pyzor
chmod -R a+rx /usr/lib/python2.3/site-packages/pyzor
chmod -R a+rx /usr/bin/pyzor
chmod -R a+rx /usr/bin/pyzord

6. The gdbm module is required for Pyzor’s operation as well. You can check if it’s installed by running:

python -c 'import gdbm' && echo 'gdbm found'

7. If you get a “gdbm found”, you’re all set. If not, run:

yum install gdbm

8. We’ll now tell Pyzor to find the Pyzor server(s):

pyzor discover

9. comming soon ...

Information on checksumming image spam

 
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/21/business/yourmoney/21spam.html

Matt Sergeant (of MessageLabs, and one of the early SpamAssassin
committers too!) is interviewed about spam, with a bit of relevance
regarding image checksumming (which we've been talking about recently):

  The spammers were trying to circumvent the world's junk-mail filters by
  embedding their messages -- whether peddling something called China
  Digital Media for $1.71 a share, or a "Hot Pick!" company called GroFeed
  for just 10 cents -- into images.

  It worked, but only briefly. Antispam developers at MessageLabs, one of
  several companies that essentially reroute their clients' e-mail traffic
  through proprietary spam-scrubbing servers before delivering it, quickly
  developed a "checksum," or fingerprint, for the images, and created a
  filter to block them. [...]

  Shortly after MessageLabs created a filter to catch the stock spams, the
  images they contained changed again.

  They were now arriving with what looked to the naked eye like a gray
  border. Zooming in, however, the MessageLabs team discovered that the
  border was made up of thousands of randomly ordered dots. Indeed, every
  message in that particular spam campaign was generated with a new image
  of the border -- each with its own random array of dots. [...]

  "We actually developed some technology to detect borders in images and
  figure out the entropy -- that is, to figure out if the border was
  random," Mr. Sergeant said. "So that was fine." Of course, shortly
  afterward, "they decided to stop using the borders," he added.

  From there, the senders began placing a small number of barely
  perceptible and, again, randomly placed dots -- a pink one here, a blue
  one there, a green one near the bottom -- throughout the images. Then
  they shifted to multiple images, with words spelled partially in plain
  text and partially as images, so that the content, when viewed on a
  common e-mail reader like Outlook or AOL, would look like an ordinary
  message.

Information on DCC license

http://www.rhyolite.com/anti-spam/dcc/

  The Distributed Checksum Clearinghouse source carries a license that is
  free to organizations that do not sell filtering devices or services
  except to their own users and that participate in the global DCC network.
  (I.e. ISPs that use the DCC to filter mail for their own users are
  intended to be covered in the free license.) You also can't call it your
  own or blame anyone for using it.

Information the Razor License

http://sourceforge.net/mailarchive/forum.php?thread_id=10079360&forum_id=4258

  Folks,

  I am pleased to announce that with the release of razor-agents
  2.81[1] a new service policy has been introduced, that makes the
  use of Razor2 service completely open and free. A license
  introduced in 2003 restricted usage by third party integrators,
  but the new license unencumbers all usage, commercial or
  otherwise.

  My company, Cloudmark, hosts and manages the backend
  infrastructure that Razor2 agents use for reporting spam and
  checking fingerprints. Cloudmark retains the right to deny
  service to anyone abusing the backend, but will not, under
  normal circumstances, restrict usage in any way.

  Share and Enjoy!

  vipul

BookMarking:

cell1

cell3

cell4

Trouble Shooting:

Go to the wiki page

Go to the 'Contact Us ' Forum

Go to the how-to's Support Forum

External Links:

http://www.rhyolite.com/anti-spam/dcc/

http://pyzor.sourceforge.net/

http://razor.sourceforge.net/

http://www.exit0.us/index.php?pagename=RulesDuJour

http://www.psoft.net/HSdocumentation/sysadmin/rulesdujour.html

http://wiki.apache.org/spamassassin/CustomRulesets

 http://www.freespamfilter.org/FC4.html

http://opensourceheaven.net/?page_id=98