Cactus Spam Filter with gmail or over other SSL connection
I have had many requests to make Cactus Spam Filter run with clients that uses gmail. Gmail only allows SSL connections (Secure Socket Layer) and therefore Cactus Spam Filter has not been able to filter spam. This shows how you can circumvent this and make Cactus Spam Filter work with any SSL connection.
Download and install a SSL proxy
First, you need to install a proxy that will be a between the mail server and client that decrypts the SSL stream locally on your computer and passes it on to your client – a bit like an intermediate translator. Since the proxy is installed locally on your computer it’s still secure.
After looking around for a bit I stumbled upon stunnel that seems to work well and is free. Download stunnel here.
You also need to download a SSL library called libssl32.dll and place it into your stunnel directory. (Note: Some people claim you need to put libssl32.dll into the windows system directory but I didn’t have to.)
Configure stunnel
In the stunnel directory there should be a file called stunnel.conf (if not you can create it) – fill it with the rows below (all that is needed):
client = yes
debug = debug
[pop3s_gmail]
accept = 127.0.0.1:11010
connect = pop3.gmail.com:995
This basically means that stunnel will accept connections locally (127.0.0.1) at port 11010 and relay it to pop3.gmail.com at port 995.
Outlook => stunnel => gmail => stunnel => Outlook
Start tunnel
Start with the -install argument, from the command line (start->run->cmd) it looks like:
c:\program files\stunnel>stunnel.exe -install
Configure your email client to go via stunnel
In your email client (e.g. Outlook) open your SSL account settings and change the POP3 server to ‘localhost’ and port to 11010 (so it connects locally to stunnel at port 11010). Here is how it’s configured in Windows Mail:
I hope you can get it working. I had some trouble getting stunnel to run and I am not sure what I did wrong in the beginning. Please comment if you have any question or complementary information.
September 26th, 2010 at 1:01 pm
I use both Incredimail and Outlook. I had some trouble with Incredimail and switched to Outlook but now I can use both. Except that Cactus Spam now ignores IM and only runs with Outlook. Is there a fix for that? I am pleased with the ease of Cactus right from the beginning. What prompted giving the product the name Cactus?
Thank you,
Jeorjette
September 26th, 2010 at 5:28 pm
Hi, what os are you using? I will try to set up some tests for the next version.
Not sure why I choose to call it Cactus, probably just something that popped up!
Best regards,
Jon
February 23rd, 2011 at 2:12 am
I was wondering how someone might be able to get Cactus to function with Hotmail? I use it with other accounts that I have and functions wonderfully. Can not seem to get it to function with Hotmail though. I would like to get to work with Hotmail Help!!!
April 12th, 2011 at 1:30 am
I sure have enjoyed having Cactus Spam over the years, but i recently changed computers to the Vista Ultimate, and can no longer get my training arena to come up, so I don’t know if it is working, or not. I never see Cactus’ name on certain emails any more, and that has me concerned.
I sure miss the little guy, too !!
Plus the fact gmail took over serving my mail program, and i have absolutely no tallent in getting into those files you talked about, for fear i will crash my machine again. Thanks so much for all the faithful years little Cactus Spam has done a fantastic job, and i so appreciate it, and its’ creator.
B.S. Melton
September 15th, 2011 at 9:13 am
Hi, here is a question from a non-advanced user: what should I do with my Outlook settings, if I can only get e-mails from my gmail account using an IMAP, not POP3? When I configure settings as you suggested, the connection to Gmail incoming server is lost and I can’t get any new e-mails to my Outlook client. Otherwise, when I configure Outlook settings according to the instruction available in my gmail account (I use the following data:
incoming server: imap.gmail.com
outgoing server: smtp.gmail.com
outgoing mail SMTP:465
incoming mail IMAP:993)
I can’t get my e-mails to the Cactus Training Area, although my stunnel is already running,its config file is set, and the libssl32.dll file is saved in the stunel directory…
What should I do? ))))
September 28th, 2011 at 5:06 pm
My Cactus spam filter, while correctly identifying email as spam, does not filter them into the Cactus folder but rather downloads it, without the “Cactus Spam” tag, into my inbox of Outlook Express..been going on for days now. A fix? thanks