The Exchange Online Protection email security engine rates promotional messages on a scale of 1 to 9

In time for the holiday shopping season, Microsoft has refined how Office 365 handles bulk promotional emails from vendors like Amazon, eBay and Macy’s.

Those messages, which contain special offers, newsletters and other sales incentives, fall into a gray area between legitimate email and obvious spam. Depending on a variety of factors, recipients sometimes find them useful and other times annoying.

Now, Microsoft has added what it describes as a “simple, intuitive control” to the Exchange Online Protection (EOP) security engine in Exchange Online so that Office 365 admins can fine-tune the treatment of these messages for their domain.

EOP rates bulk messages on a scale of 1 to 9. The lower the rating, the less likely the message will be considered a nuisance by recipients. Criteria used to rate messages include whether recipients signed up for the mailings, whether the sender offers unsubscribe options and how many complaints the emails have generated.

Office 365 sets its default threshold at 7, meaning EOP will deliver bulk messages rated 6 and lower, and throw those rated 7 and above into the spam basket. However, admins can adjust the threshold to a different number.

“Bulk email can be a real nuisance for users. We hope that this feature will help you better manage the amount of bulk email your organization receives and look forward to continually improving our anti-spam service to meet your needs,” wrote Microsoft officials Shobhit Sahay and Chris Nguyen in a blog post Monday.

Microsoft is starting to roll out the improved email management capability now. Admins that want it activated right away on their domains can place a request with Microsoft via their account team.

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