As a long time user of the Internet I have, like you, found that spam, viruses and e-mail scams have been a major curse on my Inbox. I receive on average about 100 e-mails a day of which 85% are undoubtedly unwelcome and irritating. The problem with spam is that at best it is a time waster and at the worst a potential danger due to the damage which can be wreaked by hidden viruses, scams and identity theft. I soon learned that replying to spam and asking to be removed achieved nothing other than to confirm that my e-mail address was live and in use. In my efforts at self-preservation I tried several other solutions including e-mail filtering and the built-in tools in Outlook and other e-mail programs . . . all to no avail.

About a year ago a friend suggested that I try the free version of MailWasher and try it I did. I have been using the free version of MailWasher ever since and without a doubt it has become a serious part of my daily routine. When my editor offered the opportunity to review MailWasher Pro I jumped at the chance.

First impressions of the Pro version is that it does its job very well and is a natural progression from the free version. Its ability to address multiple accounts simultaneously and the easy way in which you can define your own filters and rules make this utility a boon to any Internet user. Like many of you I have several e-mail accounts, in addition to my own domain, which is a real pain as I get all the spam for every e-mail address that my domain represents. The catch-all nature of my e-mail account also means that I get e-mail for accounts which don't exist - a royal pain in the derriere. MailWasher Pro effectively ends the painful and laborious process of manually filtering this deluge of useless e-mail through a variety of tools and filters.

If you have no familiarity with how MailWasher Pro works, it is a very simple tool which allows you to preview e-mail sitting on your server without downloading it. It does a very good job of identifying spam and even potential virii. MailWasher Pro allows you to delete, bounce and report spam, you can even blacklist/friendlist individual e-mail addresses or entire domains. Once you've processed your e-mail you can launch your preferred e-mail application and download the e-mail which has survived the filtering process. MailWasher works by checking e-mail against DNS blacklists, the local blacklists and friendlists you build with MailWasher and also with a new service called FirstAlert! which is administered by Firetrust (the publisher of MailWasher). FirstAlert! works by using a database of reported spam from other MailWasher Pro users.