In 2004, Bill Gates stood before a room full politicians, economists and business leaders and declared a war on spam.
"It will soon be a thing of the past," Microsoft's chief software architect told those gathered at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, before laying out a three-pronged approach to eradicating the scourge of unsolicited e-mail.
He promised to have the job done within two years. Now, one year later, even some critics say he's making progress.
Microsoft has been working on a number of anti-spam projects, including SmartScreen technology in Microsoft mail servers and the Sender ID program. In addition, the company has set up more than 100,000 MSN Hotmail "trap" accounts. These are accounts that the company monitors to draw in spam and follow the possible links to phishing scams.
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