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Wizcrafts' MailWasher Pro Email Spam Filters

Learn about MailWasher Pro
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What is MailWasher Pro?

MailWasher Pro is an email screening program that goes between your selected POP3 and IMAP email servers and your desktop email 'client' (e.g.: Microsoft Outlook, Outlook Express, Windows Live Mail, Thunderbird, Eudora, The Bat, etc. Not your web browser.). It automatically detects spam by scanning the headers, subject and body text, consulting online databases of known spam, checking against SpamCop, Spamhaus and other professional "DNS Blacklists," plus a BlackList each user can create by adding unwanted senders to the program's Blacklist (you can also add friends to the Friends List). MailWasher also emloys a trainable "Bayesian" learning filter and, most importantly for this discussion, user-configurable spam filters, which utilize positive and negative conditions and Regular Expressions.

Read more details about how MailWasher protects you from dangerous email threats.

When properly configured, MailWasher Pro also detects and deletes viruses embedded or attached to incoming email. With the click of a button you can view the source code of an email message, in safe, plain text, to see if it contains suspicious codes, or spam tricks, or obfuscated links to phishing websites. Learn more about how MailWasher Pro works to keep your inbox free of spam.

MailWasher Pro is free to try out for 30 days, and only costs $99.95 US for a lifetime license at the time of this writing (annual licenses are available for less). This includes program updates, a mobile version, real-time spam blocking and customer support. Your paid license can be used on 3 of your own computers, plus you get a 90-day, no questions asked money back guarantee. Download MailWasher Pro here.

What are MailWasher Pro Custom Spam Filters?

MailWasher Pro custom spam filters are written in plain text or Regular Expressions form, in multi-line XML format (version 2010 and newer), or in individual (long) line rules for the old version up to 6.5.4. They can be opened and edited in any plain text editor, like Windows Notepad, Notepad++, or NoteTab Pro by Fookes Software. When the designated conditions within a "filter" rule-set are matched by words or characters in an email message's header or body, the filter deals with those messages according to the actions option set by the user and a "spam rating number" you assign to each filter.

Read more details about how the MailWasher spam filters work and are configured.

All versions of MailWasher Pro process spam filters from the top down and halt further processing once a rule is matched. Thus, the first rule that matches something in any given incoming email is the only one processed, no matter how many other rules below it could match words in that message. This saves processing power that would otherwise be wasted parsing many other filters. For this reason, experienced users place the most common spam filters near the top of their filters list. The parsing of incoming messages (in the MailWasher "Inbox) begins with first line in the header, then proceeds to the body text. There are rule condition options to match the entire header, the "Received from" line, the "From," the "Subject" and the "Body." All of the XML versions from 2010 onward also allow for a condition labeled "Entire Message," which allows you to match a keyword that appears anywhere in an email, whether it is in the header or body. This is useful is detecting and deleting spam for certain illicit pharmaceuticals, Nigerian 419 scams and many work at home scams.

Custom filters can also be written that will halt all further processing of legitimate messages by spam filters that follow them. This type of filter is used to "whitelist" safe senders who would otherwise be blocked by custom spam filters in use, or whose email addresses contain reserved characters that the program cannot accept for use in either the Friends List, or Blacklist (such as Facebook notifications). Custom filters can also be written to prevent particular spam words quoted in replies from triggering a filter down the list. I use this type of whitelisting filter to prevent email containing quotes from my replies to other Webmasters, discussing Nigerian 419 scams, illicit drugs, or known spam domains, from automatically deleting those replies due to spam word matching.

This page contains the custom spam filter rules developed for use with MailWasher Pro by Wiz Feinberg, owner of this website. You can use them to replace the tiny default filter set created by the program itself, if you haven't modified it yet. Various filters are updated as spam techniques and catch phrases change. If you have created your own custom spam rules, I recommend that you add mine below yours. A good place to do this is directly after the default filter named "Not to me."

Instructions for applying custom MailWasher Pro spam filters

There is a download link in the section below which can be used to save my latest version of Filters.xml to your desktop, or any specified download location. It can be used to replace your entire existing Filters.xml, who's default location is in %AppData%\Roaming\Firetrust\MailWasher\. Or, it can be opened in a text editor where you can copy the filters you want to update and paste them below any custom filters you already have.

If you have the old version of MailWasher Pro (ending with 6.5.4), its work files are found in %AppData%\Roaming\MailWasherPro\ and are named "filters.txt".

Read the details about applying my custom MailWasher spam filters.

Here's how to manually replace the default or existing MailWasher Pro spam filters with my custom filters. Note that all previous filters will be removed by this technique. If you already have some custom filters, save a copy of the existing filters file first. You can copy and paste them into the new filters list later.

  1. With MailWasher Pro open, move the mouse pointer to the upper right of the program interface and click on Help, then on User Files...
  2. A folder window will open to your MailWasher Pro profile user-files. By default, this is located in your user account's %AppData%\Roaming\Firetrust\MailWasher\ folder.
  3. Next, you will use your browser to download and save my current spam filters to your Windows Desktop...
  4. Find the bold link labeled: "right-click here and 'Save link as' Filters.xml". If your browser doesn't allow this, download the zip file and use Windows, or Winzip, or 7Zip to extract Filters.xml to your desktop or preferred download folder.
  5. Save the file with that exact file name and spelling to your Desktop, making sure the F is a capital letter.
  6. Close MailWasher Pro now. This is important!
  7. Move or minimize/close any open programs that are blocking the downloaded file and the window with your MailWasher user files.
  8. Go back to the window with your MailWasher Pro profile user files and locate Filters.xml.
  9. Right-click on the file and rename it to : Filters-old.xml
  10. Use your mouse to drag and drop my downloaded Filters.xml into the MailWasher Pro user files window and choose Copy Here.
  11. Copying the file is safer than moving it in case you make a mistake and have to start over.
  12. Verify that the downloaded Filters.xml is now copied to the MailWasher Pro user files folder. It should have a file size of approximately 334 kb as of 1/10/2020.
  13. Find the desktop or Start Menu icon /link for MailWasher Pro and (double) click on it to launch the program again.
  14. Once the program opens, click on Settings, then on the left, Spam Tools, then, under Spam Tool Settings, Filters.
  15. If all is well, you should see a very long list of spam filters beginning with Restored Email on top and X-Mailer: iPad Mail on the bottom of the list.

Most computers have a built in plain text editor. Windows PCs usually ship with Notepad, which is a simple, ascii text editor. Better yet, I use NoteTab Pro and Notepad++, both of which allow you to open multiple documents in tabs, just like our modern browsers. Notepad++ is better at displaying some extended UTF8 characters than NoteTab. I open both the newly downloaded and existing filter files in tabs, then copy and paste between tabs (careful now, new to old!).

For your editing convenience, I have loaded a copy of my current filters inside an iframe down the page. You can copy just the filter sections you want and paste them into your Filters.xml using a plain text editor. Do this by placing your pointer inside the iframe, highlighting the desired line(s), then right-click and choose "Copy." Close MailWasher Pro, then navigate to its application data folder and open the existing filters.txt in Notepad, or your default .txt editor, then paste the copied rules into the file and save it. When you restart the program the new rules will be applied to all incoming messages. Note that your "Friends list" takes precedence over filter rules, unless you check the box in the rule to override the Friends list.

Hint: You can locate and open the data folder where the filters.txt or Filters.xml lives by clicking on "Help" (with MailWasher Pro open), then "About" for version 6.5.x, or "User Files" for the new version 7, then click on the link to your application data files.

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Updating these spam filters is done on my personal time. Please consider donating if you benefit from my work!

Filters last updated on November 14, 2023. Updated Sextortion Scam 2023 to detect the current scam campaign. All incoming Sextortion scam emails are reported to Spamcop to block those compromised mail servers.

Previous updates on October 19, 2023.

Read a brief history of MailWasher Pro development.

A brief history of MailWasher Pro

MailWasher began life in 2001, with version 1.0. Each year since then has seen big improvements in the quality and usability of the program (see changelog). All of the original series had versions based entirely upon the number system (e.g. 1.x - 6.x). These releases used a user configurable spam filter based upon a .txt file, named: filters.txt. Development of this system culminated in the summer of 2010, with a final release numbered version 6.5.4 Following about one year of beta testing, an entirely new design of MailWasher Pro was released in July of 2010, with version 2010. This annual numbering system lasted just two years, ending at version 2012. In March of 2013, The old numbering system was re-introduced, starting with version 7.0. This is a logical extension of the previous version numbering system, which stopped development with version 6.5.4 (release 5/30/2010). The current version of MailWasher Pro at the time of this writing is version 7.12.6.

Downloads (XML version first)

Effective March 31, 2022, the filters in the download links and iframe are the reduced set I am currently using (minus my personalized filters). If you want to download the previous full sets, use the links below the iframe.

Most, if not all web browsers alter unstyled .xml files (like those used in MailWasher 2010+), if they are loaded as is into a browser tab or window, adding clickable dashes or arrows before certain tags to hide or expand sections of the "document tree." You cannot simply load Filters.xml into a browser tab and copy it because those added on browser outline display codes will break the filters if you try to copy and paste them in as is. To correctly download my custom Filters.xml for MailWasher Pro, right-click here and 'Save link as' Filters.xml, with a capital F, to your computer. Alternately, you can download Filters.zip, save it and follow the directions in the previous section to apply the new filters.

Alternately, you can load my filter rules into the iframe, select the ones you want to use, or Select All, then Copy them. Note that I had to add a .txt extension to get the xml file to display in the orrect MailWasher format in the iframe. Drop .txt second extension if you are saving the entire contents of the iframe.

After you have copied the desired filters, open your existing filters in your preferred text editor and paste them into your existing Filters.xml, adding them below any custom filters you may already have created. Warning! Some of these filters are set to auto delete and many are set to a spam rating of -200. Use these filters at your own risk. Always back-up your existing filters before editing them or installing mine!

How to back-up your MailWasher Pro spam filters.
The easiest way to back-up your spam filters is to open the MailWasher Pro User Files location and right-click-drag/copy Filters.xml. With MailWasher open, click on "Help > User Files..." - which open the folder containing all your personal MailWasher data files. Locate Filters.xml, then use the right mouse button to drag the file slightly down or to the right, inside the window (don't drag it outside the Window!). Release the right button and left-click on Copy. This creates a file named: Filters - Copy.xml. If anything goes wrong, you can close MailWasher Pro, then delete the downloaded filters and rename the saved copy back to "Filters.xml."

If, after installing any of these filters, your filters list disappears and resorts to the default set, please contact me ASAP and let me know that I made a typo. Thanks.

Full filter set

The following is the full set of spam filters I began composing years ago and was updating until January 6, 2022. Copying and pasting individual lines with new conditions has proven to be tedious and fraught with room for errors. So, rather than editing a huge file I am leaving it as it was as of January 6, 2022. Click here to download the last full Filters.xml in a zip file. Alternately, load the full filter set into the iframe.

If you are not sure that you are using the latest version of MailWasher Pro, download it here.

Check out my security blog for tips about writing, sorting and using MailWasher Pro spam filters, as well as some articles about Regular Expressions filters and other security matters affecting computers, email and websites.

Having been a long time user of virtually all releases of MailWasher Pro, I strongly recommend that users of MailWasher 6.x upgrade to the current version 7.x, which is still receiving support and updates and doesn't tend to lock up like the previous version 6 and under if one uses a lot of filters and rules.

Filters for older version 6.x:

You can download the MailWasher version 6.x spam filter set here, by right-clicking on the link and choosing "Save As" > "filters.txt" (without quotes), to your MailWasher Pro Application Data folder, found in %AppData%\Roaming\MailWasherPro\, or to your desktop for editing and later use. These filters are all set to manual deletion. You can change the actions of various filters to Automatically Delete at your own risk.

Load Wiz's latest filters.txt set into the iframe above (v6.5.4 max). Copy and paste the changes you want.

I have stopped issuing regular updates to the old MailWasher v6.x filters.txt. This is an outdated version. If you still use MailWasher 6 and want an up to date filters list that matches the current filters.xml, contact me here about the cost for a custom list.

If MailWasher 6.x seems to have slowed down, I recommend that you occasionally click the "Process (or "Wash") Mail" button, even if there is nothing marked for deletion. For always on connections and people who check multiple email accounts frequently, MailWasher 6.x can build up a lot of temporary data that is held im memory and can slow it down, or even cause it to hang. Clicking the "Process Mail" button will free up some RAM that MailWasher consumes, clear temporary data, delete "hidden" spam messages, and can help improve the processing speed of the filters on incoming email and the general performance of the program.

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