How Do I Deal With SPAM?
Our Exchange email system is protected by Microsoft Defender to stop known suspicious or malicious emails, whether spam, phishing, spear phishing or emails containing viruses etc. However some emails can bypass the system before they are detected and should be appropriately dealt with.
Reporting and Securely Disposing of Spam or Malicious Emails
To report an email to be reviewed by Microsoft to update their detection systems:
- login to Outlook Web App https://outlook.office.com.
- Right-click on any email
- Report, and then Report Junk or Report Phishing as you see appropriate.
You can do this by dragging it into a folder in Outlook specifically for this:
Outlook Online(OWA)
- Go.shu.ac.uk/office365
- Login with userid@hallam.shu.ac.uk
- Click on Outlook
- Right click Folders and then Add public folders to Favourites
- Expand the Public Folders tree to find the folder Spam mail - not marked, select it and click ☆Add to Public Folder
- The new folder will appear under your favourites
- Drag the email into the newly added folder.
If you have clicked on a suspicious link or opened an attachment, suspect you have a virus or have any other IT security concerns, please contact IT Help.
Any suspicious emails prompting you to log in where you have actually input your details, whether this be a university system or something else, you should immediately change your password for that system, service or site. Your university password can be changed here: http://go.shu.ac.uk/password. Avoid using the same password for your work login as you do for anything else.
If you are a student who has received a phishing email, please see student information on phishing
Malicious Emails
Some emails have attachments or links designed to get you to install malware (for example, a virus) on your computer. Sometimes these emails purport to come from friends or colleagues and have generic text (like "holiday pictures" or "urgent invoice, payment required now!") to entice you to open the attachment or click on the link.
If you do not recognise the sender of an email or suspect it may not be from who it says it is from:
- Do not click on any links in the email
- Do not open any attachments
- Do not reply to it
Phishing Emails
Phishing emails are designed to trick the recipient into giving up personal and financial information (such as account details and passwords) or to trick people into performing an action (such as authorising a payment).
More support and info on Phishing can be found here: student information on phishing.
Stopping advertising and other unwanted emails
If you receive mail that is not suspicious or potentially threatening, but you do not want to receive further mail from the sender, this is what to do:Is it from a mailing list that you have actually signed up to?
If it is, every email from them should have an 'unsubscribe' link at the end. Click this link to remove yourself from the mailing list. This may not have an immediate effect if they send frequent mail.
Is it from an unsolicited source?
If it is, then clicking any link on the email can alert the sender that they have hit a valid email address. With this type of mail, you can block the sender rather than unsubscribe. There are two to do this.
- From an email in your Outlook inbox:
- Right-click on the email from your inbox
- Select ‘Junk’
- Select ‘Block Sender’
From an email put into quarantine by the university’s mail filter:
- Open the quarantine notification email
- Click the ‘block sender’ button in the email
- Access the email quarantine portal directly
- Select the checkbox next to the email from the user you would like to block
- Select the ‘More’ dropdown at the top of the page
Select ‘Block sender’