First the press release last week and in today's Technology column in the Chicago Tribune comes an article about MailLaunder....
For the most part, the article reflects my conversation with Jon Van last week. The part about the cellphone was slightly taken out of context, I was referring to the competition and how I differentiated myself. Not a big deal.
By Jon Van Published April 24, 2006As part of his consulting business, Donald Drake provides Web hosting for some of his small-business clients, and he's been struck by how much unwanted electronic mail they get.
The Chicago-based consultant uses several open-source tools to sort out the spam, and he tweaks that software with some variations of his own. For one thing, he looks for uniform resource locators, or URLs, within e-mails intended to direct recipients to a Web site.
"Spammers are mostly trying to sell you something, and they usually have a URL embedded in their text to direct you to a site where they do business," Drake said. "My software looks for those and spots the known spammer sites."
Many spammers in Russia don't use Web sites, but they have phone numbers in their messages, Drake said, and his software looks for those phone numbers to spot spam. He also looks for URLs that direct people to bogus Web sites intended to look like the sites operated by legitimate banks and online merchants.
A major component of malevolent e-mail these days is a warning that customers of legitimate businesses need to go to a Web site and provide their Social Security and credit card numbers to assure the integrity of their accounts. The actual purpose of these "phishing" messages is to steal personal information that may be used later in fraudulent schemes.
Drake also incorporates antivirus software in his screening software, but he's found that computer viruses are a declining threat in e-mail, while phishing is on the rise.
After a year of building an effective spam filter for the Web sites he hosts, Drake decided to start promoting his filter, called MailLaunder.com, as a general service for small- and medium-size businesses.
"I've been promoting it for about a month," Drake said, "and have gotten clients in the Chicago area and Wisconsin. I also have a few clients outside the Midwest."
There are many spam filter services, and Drake said he hopes to compete through personalized service.
"I give clients my cell phone number," he said.
The persistent danger with filters is that they will label legitimate communications as spam, and Drake supplies his clients twice a day with an inventory of the communications his program has quarantined as spam.
"They can scan through it quickly and retrieve anything they want," he said. "Then they can alert us to white-list e-mail from those sources."
Drake charges roughly $1 per month per employee using e-mail that goes through his filtering service.
"The amount of spam varies from one client to another," he said. "In general, it's about 50 percent to 80 percent of total e-mail. In some cases, it exceeds 90 percent."
The MailLaunder press release came out this week:
http://www.maillaunder.com/release20060417.php
E-MAIL FILTERING SYSTEM PREVENTS SPAM AND VIRUS THREATS TO SMALL- AND MEDIUM-SIZE BUSINESSESCHICAGO, April 17, 2006 - Drake Consulting, provider of technology consulting services, announced the launch of MailLaunder.com, an easy-to-use Web service that stops viruses and blocks spam before they reach subscribers' networks.
Using cutting-edge technology and an innovative set of rules, the MailLaunder System sorts subscribers' e-mail, then it eliminates viruses and quarantines spam so that it can be viewed by subscribers at their convenience. All valid messages are delivered immediately.
MailLaunder.com arrives in the market place as Internet viruses, spam and "phishing scams" - attempts to gain password, credit card information and other personal data - continue to escalate from mere annoyance to major impediment to American businesses.
In fact, according to the Gartner Group, phishing cost U.S. banks and credit card issuers $1.2 billion in 2003, when approximately 57 million Americans received these types of messages.
And even more alarming for all types of businesses, the 2004 National Technology Readiness Survey - conducted by Rockbridge Associates and the Center for Excellence in Service at the University of Maryland's Robert H. Smith School of Business - says that the cost of spam to American companies in terms of lost productivity has reached $21.6 billion annually.
"But the affect on the general employee's productivity is just the tip of the iceberg," says Don Drake, founder of Drake Consulting and lead developer of the MailLaunder System. "There's also a tremendous drain on IT and Help Desk resources as they battle these messages that can do irreparable damage to company networks and proprietary information."
The MailLaunder solution uses all open-source technologies including: PostgreSQL database, XMail mail server, Linux operating system, Perl code and PHP front-end. It is recommended for individuals and small- and medium-size businesses with their own domain name.
For more information about the MailLaunder System, visit http://www.maillaunder.com.
About Drake Consulting: Drake Consulting develops performance analysis tools and services for the wireless and online industries, including Meridian One and XMail Scripts. Drake Consulting also provides technology consulting services and staff augmentation to a wide range of clients in the Chicago area, including telecommunications, retail, financial and e-commerce companies. For more information, visit DrakeConsult.com.
MAILLAUNDER.COM CONTACT:
Don Drake
1-800-733-2143