No, and no anti-spam in the World is. That said, our experience is that you can expect detection rates to be well into the late nineties in percentage terms. The problem is this: One person's spam is other person's fantastic offer. A computer simply can't be taught (yet!) about your personal tastes. So, the approach taken is to decide whether the email has decided to conceal its origin and content in some way. For example, most spam does not come from a valid email address and has an alternative web link or address, so this scores highly in the detection system. Emails containing 'mashed' words like 'Un1-vers.i.ty D.i.p.l.o.maz' are trying to trick us, so they also score highly.

A reasonable guide is this: With our system, spam will be reduced from a daily pest to the occasional surprise and will in no way detract from your daily work or play.

We use SpamAssassin, a well-respected, community-developed detection engine. Each email is subjected to literally hundreds of tests to discover how to got here, where is came from and analysis for unusual content. Each test gives a score, which are totalled. If the score is higher than your 'threshold' score, the email is deemed spam. You can control the threshold score (and therefore the sensitivity of the system) in your Control Panel.

It is placed in your 'Spam' folder. You can access this folder using your Control Panel, Webmail or IMAP client (IMAP users only).

Have you changed the default detection level? Try 'Extreme' and see if that makes a difference.

These are known as 'false positives'. If the emails in question are from a regular correspondent add their address to your whitelist in the Control Panel. Otherwise, try lowering your detection level one at a time in the Control Panel.

5 days.

Newsletters are normally from a valid source and so score lowly on the detection engine. Add the sender address to your blacklist in the Control Panel.

Probably. It's certainly 99.999% effective. Our virus detection is provided by Kaspersky, one of the best in the business and we have no confirmed reports of viruses ever having got through the system.

Viruses have a signature, like a fingerprint. Each email is tested against our database of fingerprints. If a match is found, the virus is removed from the message and sent to you with a notification.

You'll get a notification from us with the 'cleaned' message attached.

You can switch them off (they go to your spam folder instead).

No. Most viruses forge the sender address.

If a virus is found it is you who gets the notification, not the recipient.

Every 15 minutes.