Vancouver-based MailChannels annouced today that Apache SpamAssassin users can now download Traffic Control to dramatically enhance the performance of SpamAssassin. MailChannels released a Free version of their carrier-grade anti-spam product for non-commercial users. This marks the first time open source users have had access to email traffic shaping software, a technology previously only available to high-end, networking equipment.
What's this all about? MailChannels has applied traffic shaping - a networking technique that interferes with traffic by selectively restricting bandwidth - to email. This causes spam software to time out and move on to more vulnerable targets. Instead of trying to block spam email, the MailChannels system prevents spam from leaving the spammers' servers.
Traffic Control 3 for SpamAssassin is available here. Commercial use requires a license but a 30-day evaluation is provided free of charge.
