Terms of Service
Can I use my WiscMail/WiscMail Plus account for personal use?
You are allowed De Minimis use of UW-Madison IT resources as defined in UW-Madison’s Appropriate Use Policy (http://www.cio.wisc.edu/policies/appropriateuse.aspx). Be aware, however that personal communications sent and received on University systems or equipment are subject to employer inspection in the event the University has a legitimate purpose for doing so. Examples of a legitimate need include, but are not limited to: 1) responding to a public records request, 2) conducting a disciplinary investigation, or 3) investigating a work-related complaint from a third party.
Eligibility
Quota
Each account on the WiscMail system will be given 200 MB to store email messages on the server. View the
quota page for more information.
WiscMail / WiscMail Plus - Quota FAQs
Junk Mail and Trash Retention
All messages in the "Junk Mail" and "Trash" folders will be automatically deleted after 15 days of age. This is a data-to-date comparison.
IMPORTANT: Do not use the "Junk Mail" or "Trash" folders for retaining your mail. If you want to save your email, use the information provided under the
filtering and manage your IMAP folders area.
Virus Scanning
WiscMail will virus scan all inbound and outbound mail.
- All detected viruses will be removed and replaced with a warning message.
- Inbound mail containing a virus will also be flagged as Spam.
- We discard the majority of virus messages which are known "spammy" variants.
Unsolicited Bulk Email (Spam)
WiscMail will spam scan all inbound mail and rate it from 1-8.
- Mailboxes with filtering active will read this spam score and act according to the wishes of the owner, usually filing the spam into the Junk Mail folder.
- Mailbox owners may further customize their filtering preferences to block or allow certain domains or addresses.
- Users of off-campus ISPs such as Charter or SBC may occasionally inherit an IP number that was previously used by a spammer and is currently on an industry RBL (Realtime Block List). We do not use RBLs to block mail, but this can skew spam scan ratings. If you think your routine mail is being rated as spam, contact the Help Desk for assistance.
- An attempt will be made to exempt messages from spam scanning if they are sent by authenticated users and/or campus origin. However, because this information can be easily forged, we will err on the side of caution if the sender/origin cannot be determined beyond a reasonable doubt.
- Legitimate mail, especially mass mailings, may be interpreted as spam because of content or formatting. If your messages are being mislabeled as spam, contact the Help Desk for assistance.
- If you wish to report messages as spam or not-spam but do not require DoIT support, then you may forward the full source of the messages to our automated system. Forward misclassified spam messages to is-spam@doit.wisc.edu. Forward misclassified legitimate messages to not-spam@doit.wisc.edu.
- Spam Scan & Rate Exceptions: None
Forward Policy
Some non-UW email providers to which mail is forwarded can categorize some forwarded mail as bulk mail or spam. As a result, placing a forward means timely and proper delivery cannot be guaranteed as final delivery to the destination mailbox is not within our control.
High volumes of forwarded bulk mail can lead some external email providers to block the successful delivery of all UW mail into their systems. To prevent such unexpected mail stoppages from effecting the entire University population we reserve the right to exclude messages identified as highly likely to be bulk mail from the allowable forwarded mail. Obvious bulk mail, defined as email receiving a spam score of 7 out of 7 stars, is currently not being forwarded to the following email providers:
- gmail.com
- hotmail.com
- yahoo.com
- aol.com
- comcast.com
- msn.com
- sbcglobal.net
- charter.net
- excite.com
For more information on bulk mail, see the spam section:
Unsolicited Bulk Email (Spam).
Throttling
WiscMail will impose throttling policies on all mail received from outside of the 'Campus'.
- The 'Campus' is defined as the UW-Madison IP space including: 144.92.0.0, 128.104.0.0, 128.105.0.0, 72.33.0.0, 146.151.0.0 & 198,150.0.0.
- Throttling will allow 4 connections per outside MTA per WiscMail MTA per minute, with 50 messages per connection. When the throttle limit is reached WiscMail will issue a 421 error code. This is a temporary error, meaning that MTA can try sending the message again at a later time.
- RFC compliant MTAs will have no trouble with this policy. Outside mailers that do not deploy an MTA will experience connection problems, especially those that choose to send bulk mail programmatically using a 'machine-gun' approach.
- Campus departments should keep this in mind when contracting out various email related functions to 3rd parties, such as surveys, solicitations and announcements.
- Throttling Exception Requirements:
- Exception requests should originate from a UW-Madison department and include a department contact as well as the exception information in the next bullet.
- Exception requests must have valid, electronic and non-electronic contact information for the Company or Organization doing the actual mail. This should include: name, company, phone number, physical mailing address and email address. An ending date should be included and should be less than one year. We can exempt up to five IP numbers from throttling.
- Email content must be relevant to UW-Madison's mission of teaching, research and public service. Email must comply with the policy governing Appropriate Use of UW Information Technology Resources. Email must be related to the programs or operations of the University. Email can include ticket prices for UW-Madison events.
- Email cannot be sent for personal purposes or gain.
- Email subject line must be descriptive.
- Body of email must contain the UW sender's name or department affiliation.
- Bulk mailings should contain simple and obvious unsubscribe mechanisms, such as a working link to a unsubscribe system or a valid "reply to:" address.
- Throttling Exceptions do not exempt messages from spam scanning. We will scan all mail as potential spam regardless of originating IP address.
In an effort to mitigate the negative effects of compromised accounts, WiscMail also imposes the following limits on all mail received from authenticated WiscMail and WiscMail Plus users.
- 40,000 emails per hour.
- 50,000 emails per day.
- 1000 emails per hour for mail addressed outside of 'Campus'.
- 50 emails per hour for mail that is detected as spam.
For more information about how WiscMail limits outbound mail see:
http://kb.wisc.edu/wiscmail/page.php?id=3998#authspam
DoIT's WiscList and Mass Email services are recommended for those wishing to send mass mailings as they can bypass most of the throttling that WiscMail imposes. For more information see:
Obtaining multiple addresses
The campus WiscMail email system provides one address for each individual. If you want an additional, specialized address (such as myname@departmentname.wisc.edu or myservicename@mydepartment.wisc.edu) have your department set up a WiscMail Plus account. WiscMail Plus enables your department to add, remove and modify addresses within the domain you request. For details see the WiscMail Plus site:
http://www.doit.wisc.edu/WiscMailPlus/index.asp.
Application/Programatic Use
WiscMail is intended only for use by individuals for the sending and receiving of electronic communications. Integration of any WiscMail function into an application or any other programmatic function for use other than individual access to email services is strictly prohibited. Restricted uses include but are not limited to:
- authentication services
- smtp relay for web based forms
- smtp relay for email gateway applications
- smtp host for applications requiring a relay for notification function
- smtp relay for sending "Collateral Spam" (messages that are automatically sent to forged addresses from incoming messages,) including, but not limited to:
- Challenge/Response spam filtering
- Virus or Spam failure notices
- "Out of Office" notifications
WiscMail Administration reserves the right to expressly prohibit such activity when identified. Advance communication will be attempted to those in violation of the above and a transition timeline can be established where warranted. Questions you may have about your particular situation should be directed to WiscMail Administration via the DoIT HelpDesk.
Mail Standards
WiscMail and WiscMail Plus attemp to follow email protocol standards as closely as possible.
When a WiscMail Plus domain is activated, the following accounts are automatically created within the domain per RFC requirements and recommendations:
- postmaster
- Is an administrative account that is forwarded to wiscmail-postmaster@doit.wisc.edu.
- abuse
- Is used for reporting possible email abuse. It is forwarded to abuse@wisc.edu.
