Knowledge Base

Email Filters in cpanel

Email filters use the criteria that you specify to determine how to handle email messages. The following cPanel interfaces allow you to configure email filters:

Global Email Filters

cPanel >> Home >> Email >> Global Email Filters
Global email filters affect the cPanel account's email addresses.

Email Filters

cPanel >> Home >> Email >> Email Filters
User-level filters affect specific email addresses on the cPanel account.

Filter rules and criteria

The first set of options specifies which part of the email message the system examines to determine whether the message matches your filter parameters.

You can choose from the following options

Option	Description
Any Header	Any part of the message's header.
Any recipient	Any recipient of the message.
Body	The message's content.
From	The message sender's address.
Has not been previously delivered	The system only examines messages that remain in the queue for delivery.
is an Error Message	The system only examines error messages that an auto-response system sends.
List ID	The account's mailing lists.
Reply Address	The address at which the sender receives replies.
Spam Bar	The content of the Spam Bar header that Apache SpamAssassin generated for this message. The more plus signs (+) that Apache SpamAssassin assigns to a message, the greater the likelihood that the system marks the message as spam.
Spam Score	The total number of plus signs (+) in the Spam Bar value, expressed as an integer. For more information about the Spam Score option, read the Spam Score section below.
Spam Status	Whether Apache SpamAssassin™ marked the message as spam. The Spam Status line begins with Yes or No.
Subject	The message's subject line.
To	The address to which the sender sent the message. Note: Generally, the recipient does not receive the BCC field in an email's header. For this reason, you cannot use the BCC field in a filter.

Operators in filters

After you select the portion of the email message that the system will examine, select the type of comparison between that portion of the email and the criteria that you enter.

You can choose from the following options

Option	Description
equals	The message exactly matches a defined string.
matches regex	The message matches a regular expression that you define. Note The filter text box accepts regular expressions when you select this option, rather than commonly-used wildcard characters (for example, * or ?).
contains	The message a string that you define.
does not contain	The message does not contain the defined string.
begins with	The message begins with the defined string.
ends with	The message ends with the defined string.
does not begin	The message does not begin with the defined string.
does not end with	The message does not end with the defined string.
does not match	The message does not exactly match the defined string.

Spam Score

The following options are only applicable when you select the Spam Score option:

Option	Description
is above (#s only)	The message's Spam Score is greater than the number that you define.
is not above (#s only)	The message's Spam Score is equal to or less than the number that you define.
is below (#s only)	The message's Spam Score is less than the number that you define.
is not below (#s only)	The message's Spam Score is greater than or equal to the number that you define.

Note

When you create a filter that uses several operators, the system processes the and operator before the or operator. For example:

The system processes A or B and C as A or (B and C).
The system processes A and B or C as (A and B) or C.

Criteria

Enter the criteria to use in the text box under the Rules menus. The type of data that you enter determines the comparison that the system performs.

For example, if you select the From and Equals filters, enter [email protected] as the criteria. The system determines that any email from [email protected] matches the filter, but does not match [email protected] because it contains additional letters.

Note

Exim converts newlines into spaces in the $message_body field. Do not add \n characters to any body filters that you create.

Actions

When cPanel determines that an email message matches your filter, it handles that message with the any of the following actions that you specify:

Action	Description
Discard Message	The system discards the incoming message with no failure notice.
Redirect to email	The system forwards the message to another email address that you specify.
Fail with message	The system discards the message and automatically send a failure notice to the sender.
Stop Processing Rules	The system skips all filter rules.
Deliver to folder	The system delivers the message to a specified folder.
Pipe to a program	The system sends the incoming message to a specified program. For more information, read the Pipe to a Program section below.

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