Spam Sucks
As I may have mentioned, spam sucks.
Here are a couple of resources I use to reduce the amount of spam that I see.
Realtime Block Lists
I use the following realtime block lists to reduce spam, listed in no particular order of preference.
http://www.spamhaus.org/images/sblbutton.gif http://www.spamhaus.org/images/xblbutton.gif http://www.spamcop.net/images/spamcop.gif http://www.dnsbl.sorbs.net/images/sorbsbtn.gif
http://mail-abuse.org/rbl/mapsrbl.gif
http://swapoff.org/images/dsbl.png
Open-Relay Database
DNS Realtime Block List
Spam Filters
Spam Assassin
I can not speak highly enough of Spam Assassin, it is incredibly comprehensive in the methods it uses to eradicate spam.
I particularly like its use of pyzor, which is a collaborative database of spam message digests.
spamprobe
Spamprobe is a Bayesian spam filter. By feeding Spamprobe a corpus of good and bad E-Mail, it learns what you think is spam.
Because spammers change their modus operandi so frequently, however, you will occasionally see a spam slip through.
Spam E-Mail Harvester Trap
DNS Based Solutions
There are several proposals to combat spam from the server side. Most of them rely on the fact that the majority of spam is delivered through servers that are not mail servers. This includes open HTTP proxies, SOCKS proxies, compromised desktop machines, etc. Basically, spammers have no ethics whatsoever and will use any means to deliver their crap to your inbox.
By adding new RR's to DNS that inform recipients which servers deliver mail for a domain, the receiving end can be relatively sure that the mail is legitimate.
If the use of these records were mandated, spammers would have to relay through legitimate mail servers, making them much easier to trace.