Summary
Barracuda spam filter clicks primarily stem from the filter's robust security features, such as URL rewriting, sandboxing, and Advanced Threat Protection. These systems are designed to pre-scan all links within incoming emails, identifying potential threats before the message reaches the recipient's inbox. This pre-scanning process registers as automated 'clicks' in email tracking platforms, leading to significantly inflated click-through rates. While these false clicks do not directly impede email deliverability, they severely distort key engagement metrics, making it challenging for marketers to accurately gauge genuine user interaction and optimize their campaigns effectively. Marketers must employ strategies to differentiate human engagement from these security-driven automated clicks for more accurate reporting.
Key findings
- Automated Link Pre-Scanning: Barracuda's email security features, including Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) and Link Protection, proactively pre-scan URLs in incoming emails. This process involves Barracuda's servers initiating clicks on these links to assess their safety before the email reaches the recipient.
- Inflated Click-Through Rates: These automated security checks register as 'clicks' in email tracking systems, leading to significantly inflated click-through rates. This makes it challenging for marketers to distinguish genuine user engagement from bot activity and accurately gauge campaign performance.
- Security vs. Metrics Conflict: While essential for recipient security against malicious content and zero-day exploits, Barracuda's pre-scanning directly impacts email metrics by distorting reported engagement data. These are 'false' or 'phantom' clicks that do not represent human interaction.
- Indirect Deliverability Impact: Barracuda clicks do not directly prevent emails from reaching the inbox. However, by skewing engagement metrics, they can indirectly affect perceived deliverability, as marketers often use these metrics to assess list health and overall campaign success, potentially leading to misinformed optimization decisions.
Key considerations
- Accurate Data Analysis: Marketers must employ methods to identify and filter out automated clicks from security scanners like Barracuda to obtain accurate engagement data and prevent misinterpretations of campaign performance. This includes establishing a signal-to-noise ratio for click metrics.
- Prioritize Conversions: The most reliable measure of email campaign success is actual conversion, whether that is a completed transaction or another desired action, rather than relying solely on inflated click-through rates from security scans.
- Leverage Bot Detection: Utilize available ESP features, such as hidden links, that can help detect and subtract bot-generated clicks from aggregate metrics, improving the accuracy of reported engagement. Future advancements may include machine learning to normalize for this activity.
- Understand Security Functions: Recognize that Barracuda's automated link pre-scanning is a crucial security measure designed to protect recipients from malicious content, even though it creates 'false clicks' in email analytics.
What email marketers say
15 marketer opinions
Barracuda spam filters, like many advanced email security gateways, implement automated link pre-scanning as a core protective measure against malicious content. This essential security function involves Barracuda's servers proactively clicking on URLs within incoming emails to assess potential threats. While crucial for recipient safety, these system-generated actions are recorded as clicks in email tracking platforms, leading to significantly inflated click-through rates. This phenomenon creates a substantial challenge for email marketers, as it obscures genuine user engagement and makes it difficult to accurately measure campaign performance and optimize strategies based on true audience interaction. The impact is primarily on the integrity of metrics rather than direct deliverability to the inbox.
Key opinions
- Automated Link Validation: Barracuda's security gateways perform automated pre-scanning of links within emails, simulating clicks to validate URL safety, which is a standard practice among email security solutions.
- Skewed Engagement Data: These security-driven clicks artificially inflate email campaign click-through rates and other engagement metrics, making it challenging for marketers to discern actual recipient interaction from bot activity.
- No Direct Deliverability Harm: The automated clicks generated by Barracuda's filters do not directly prevent emails from being delivered to the inbox; their primary effect is on the accuracy of reported campaign analytics.
- Indirect Influence on Strategy: While not a direct deliverability issue, the distortion of engagement metrics can lead marketers to misinterpret campaign success and list health, potentially influencing optimization decisions based on inaccurate data.
Key considerations
- Prioritize Conversion Tracking: For a reliable measure of email campaign success, marketers should focus on actual conversions--defined as the desired action, whether transactional or otherwise--as these are less susceptible to bot interference than click metrics.
- Filter Bot Traffic: It is essential for marketers to develop methods, such as utilizing hidden links or applying signal-to-noise ratio analysis, to identify and filter out automated clicks from security scanners like Barracuda to obtain clean engagement data.
- Understand Security Mandate: Acknowledge that Barracuda's link pre-scanning is a fundamental security feature designed to protect recipients from threats, even while it complicates email analytics.
- Leverage ESP Capabilities: Explore and utilize features provided by Email Service Providers (ESPs) that help detect and mitigate bot clicks, with the potential for future machine learning applications to normalize these metrics.
Marketer view
Marketer from Email Geeks explains that Barracuda spam filter clicks are automated tests of links in the message to see if they pose any risks to users. Ken O'Driscoll also states that conversion can be any CTA, not necessarily an e-commerce transaction, and historically, complaint rate is a good place to start looking for any potential issues.
2 Oct 2021 - Email Geeks
Marketer view
Marketer from Email Geeks explains that deliverability does not equal inbox placement, and it is possible that delivery is high, but inbox placement is incredibly low.
22 Aug 2022 - Email Geeks
What the experts say
2 expert opinions
Barracuda spam filters, through their advanced security features, proactively pre-scan links within emails for malicious content. This process generates automated "false clicks" or "machine-generated clicks" that significantly inflate reported click-through rates. These artificial clicks do not reflect genuine human interaction, leading to a distorted view of actual recipient engagement and overall campaign performance. This misrepresentation of metrics can indirectly impact email deliverability, as senders may misjudge audience interest or list health, potentially leading to suboptimal strategy adjustments.
Key opinions
- Automated Link Validation: Barracuda's security features perform automated pre-scanning of links in emails, simulating clicks to identify malicious content.
- Inflated Engagement Metrics: This automated activity results in a significant, artificial inflation of click-through rates and other email engagement metrics.
- Distorted Performance Assessment: The presence of machine-generated clicks makes it difficult for email senders to accurately assess genuine human engagement and the true effectiveness of their campaigns.
- Indirect Deliverability Influence: While not directly blocking emails, the skewed metrics can lead to misinterpretations of list health and audience interest, indirectly influencing deliverability strategies and outcomes.
Key considerations
- Accurate Metric Interpretation: Senders must develop strategies to distinguish between genuine human clicks and automated clicks from security filters to gain a clearer understanding of campaign performance.
- Focus on True Engagement: Relying on metrics beyond raw click-through rates, such as conversions or actual site activity, provides a more accurate measure of recipient interest and campaign success.
- Strategic Adjustments: Misinterpreting engagement data due to false clicks can lead to incorrect strategic decisions regarding email content, segmentation, or frequency, potentially affecting long-term deliverability.
- Security Function Understanding: Acknowledge that Barracuda's automated link scanning is a vital security measure, despite its impact on email analytics.
Expert view
Expert from Spam Resource explains that security features, such as those used by Barracuda, often pre-scan links within emails. This process generates automated 'false clicks' that artificially inflate click-through rates in email metrics. These clicks do not represent genuine human engagement, skewing the sender's understanding of recipient interest and campaign performance, which can indirectly affect deliverability if engagement is misjudged based on these skewed numbers.
8 Mar 2022 - Spam Resource
Expert view
Expert from Word to the Wise shares that email security services, including Barracuda, frequently pre-click URLs within emails to scan for malicious content. This automated behavior results in inflated click-through rates that do not reflect actual user engagement. These machine-generated clicks distort email metrics, making it challenging for senders to accurately assess campaign effectiveness and recipient interest, which can negatively impact deliverability by obscuring true list health and engagement patterns.
29 Mar 2024 - Word to the Wise
What the documentation says
4 technical articles
Barracuda's email security systems, such as Advanced Threat Protection and Link Protection, proactively scan URLs within incoming messages. This involves rewriting links and 'clicking' them through Barracuda's servers to identify potential threats, a measure that occurs before the email reaches the recipient's inbox. While vital for protecting users from malicious content, this pre-scanning activity registers as automated clicks in email tracking platforms, leading to an artificial inflation of click-through rates and a skewed perception of genuine user engagement. The impact is primarily on the accuracy of email performance metrics, not on direct deliverability.
Key findings
- Proactive Link Validation: Barracuda's security features, including URL rewriting and sandboxing, involve automated pre-scanning of embedded links in emails.
- Automated Click Registration: These security scans are logged as 'clicks' by email tracking systems, occurring before the actual recipient has a chance to interact with the email.
- Distorted Engagement Metrics: The automated clicks significantly inflate reported click-through rates, making it challenging for marketers to accurately assess genuine human interaction and campaign effectiveness.
- Core Security Function: The primary purpose of these pre-clicks is to provide essential protection against malicious links and zero-day exploits, safeguarding recipients.
Key considerations
- Accurate Metric Interpretation: It is crucial for marketers to understand that a portion of reported clicks may be machine-generated by security filters like Barracuda, requiring adjusted analysis for true engagement.
- Focus on Post-Click Behavior: To mitigate the impact of inflated click data, prioritize deeper engagement metrics such as conversions, website visits, or other downstream actions that confirm genuine user interest.
- Security vs. Analytics Trade-off: Acknowledge that the automated clicks are a byproduct of a necessary security measure, even if they complicate email analytics.
- Data Segmentation and Filtering: Implement strategies to identify and potentially filter out these automated clicks from security services to achieve a more precise understanding of recipient behavior.
Technical article
Documentation from Barracuda Campus explains that Barracuda Email Gateway Defense's Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) includes URL rewriting and sandboxing. This process involves Barracuda's servers pre-scanning links in incoming emails, which registers as clicks in email tracking systems before the email even reaches the recipient, a security measure to prevent users from clicking on malicious links.
25 Sep 2022 - Barracuda Campus
Technical article
Documentation from Barracuda Campus explains that Barracuda Email Gateway Defense's Link Protection feature rewrites URLs to Barracuda's domain, enabling the system to scan and analyze the linked content. When an email is opened, these rewritten links are often pre-scanned by Barracuda's servers, which can be logged as 'clicks' by tracking systems, even if the user hasn't interacted with the link yet, thus impacting email metrics.
18 Jan 2022 - Barracuda Campus
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