I hope your problems are resolved.

Outlook is NOT the actual email receiver/sender. It is a MS(Microsoft)based program that acts as an "interface" for you to make your life simpler(yeah, right!)

In other words...

"hotmail" "yahoo" "msn" all have their email accounts. The only difference is that your "outlook" is served by (usually) your ISP provider, which in your case, is Verizon.

Meaning-you are actually using a "verizon" account that uses the OUTLOOK interface.

If you were to have an "earthlink" account. You would use "outlook" as your interface.

Now, some people prefer using the Mozilla(firefox) email interface that is called "Thunderbird"

they claim to have additional filters and safe guards.

If you were to use "thunderbird" as your interface. You would still have "Verizon" as your email provider.

Bob is right about there are no absolute ways to filter out all spams. They are always a step ahead. I really doubt you are getting emails from the China Corp. More than likely, you are getting scrambled emails that uses other names to "phish" you.

For example. People send out spams using "Citicorp" but they are not affiliated at all with "Citicorp" but will tell you that you are pre-approved for a credit card. Once you've replied to them or go to their website, you've been "hooked" as a "phish"

And yes, you can have your filter setting to what Bob suggested and he's right in that anyone new that you want to exchange emails with, you'd have to make sure you add their names before hand. Otherwise, it'll goto the spam filter.

It sucks, doesn't it? *shrug...