Knowsley Safari Parks and Estates story

SPAM problem was considerable

Knowsley, of course, is run like any other businesses, and requires email for each of its team members. Whilst they only utilise approximately 200 email addresses, their SPAM problem was considerable, mainly because the domain name knowsley.com had been used for quite a number of years, and was well known and used.

Knowsley uses local IT service company CHT Solutions to install and back-up its IT infrastructure, and CHT is a long-time reseller of Giacom. CHT presented Giacom’s MessageStream service to a number of key clients, including Duncan Gornall, IT Support Manager at Knowsley.

Knowsley was using a single installation of Microsoft’s Exchange Server to handle all the businesses email. Under normal circumstances, this would be sufficient, however, bearing in mind the reported spam problem, this mail server soon became overwhelmed.

No downtime or disruption

The integration with MessageStream was easy and painless for Knowsley with no downtime or disruption to their normal email services. CHT Solutions provided Giacom with each of Knowsley’s email addresses, and the IP address of the Exchange Server. Passwords were included with each of the mailboxes so end users could access their own MessageStream account and identify any emails that had been withheld, plus search through their personal email archives.

More stable and reliable

Only then was the extent of Knowsley’s spam problem revealed – MessageStream was stopping 20,000 spam emails each day to the knowsley.com domain. Inevitably, the load on the Exchange Server lifted immediately, and the network was subsequently much more stable and reliable. Further more, the addition of MessageStream to their mail service meant that each email was being recorded and logged into off-site secure archives, and retrievable in the event of any future data loss or litigation. It also provided Knowsley with a buffer in case their Exchange Server goes offline, allowing up to seven days of no ‘bounce-backs’ – an essential benefit considering Knowsley is running only one mail server.

Duncan Gornall from Knowsley was extremely pleased with the outcome, and wrote the following testimonial following successful testing of MessageStream:

“SPAM? What SPAM? From around September 2003 until April 2006 we had an ever increasing torrent of SPAM mail. Although we had good quality local network solutions in place, the ever escalating levels of rough emails being handled by the server caused a great deal of instability and downtime Indeed, the last six months, for me, became something of an admin nightmare – constantly checking, seven days a week, that everything was working as it should to keep the clients working as best as possible (something of a pain for a one man department).

SPAM as we knew it is a thing of the past. However, since April all that has changed. With the adoption of MessageStream, and a new server, SPAM as we knew it is a thing of the past. MessageStream is blocking somewhere in the region of 20,000+ emails a day! Junk that used to be processed here. Junk that would from time to time cause our Exchange Server to hang requiring a reboot and network wide disturbance to recover from. It's now quite rare to get SPAM mail here. I only wish it had been available 3 years ago!

It may sound like I'm on commission from Giacom, but I'd never go back to using local filtration as my first line defence. It's simply not worth the hassle. MessageStream has more than paid for itself many times over and I'd have no hesitation recommending it to anyone.

So, as I said at the start. SPAM? What SPAM? I think we're as covered as we can be. Unless you know different?”

Duncan Gornall
IT Support Manager
Knowsley Safari Parks and Estates

www.knowsley.com