embodiments of the present invention relates generally to tracking and storage of electronic messages , such as email messages , for example . in particular , some embodiments relate to electronic messages , such as email messages , which have been identified as spam or virus - infected by an appropriate service , such as a real - time email spam filter ( e . g ., fortiguard antispam subscription service ) and / or a real - time email virus scanner ( e . g ., fortiguard antivirus subscription service ). in the following description , for the purposes of explanation , numerous specific details are set forth in order to provide a thorough understanding of embodiments of the present invention . it will be apparent , however , to one skilled in the art that embodiments of the present invention may be practiced without some of these specific details . embodiments of the present invention may be provided as a computer program product , which may include a machine - readable medium having stored thereon instructions which may be used to program a computer ( or other electronic devices ) to perform a process . the machine - readable medium may include , but is not limited to , floppy diskettes , optical disks , compact disc read - only memories ( cd - roms ), and magneto - optical disks , roms , random access memories ( rams ), erasable programmable read - only memories ( eproms ), electrically erasable programmable read - only memories ( eeproms ), magnetic or optical cards , flash memory , or other type of media / machine - readable medium suitable for storing electronic instructions . while , for convenience , embodiments of the present invention are described with reference to a tracking and storage of email messages , embodiments of the present invention are equally applicable to various other types of electronic messages and data . for the sake of illustration , various embodiments of the present invention have herein been described in the context of computer programs , physical components , and logical interactions within modern computer networks . importantly , while these embodiments describe various aspects of the invention in relation to modern computer networks and programs , the method and apparatus described herein are equally applicable to other systems , devices , and networks as one skilled in the art will appreciate . as such , the illustrated applications of the embodiments of the present invention are not meant to be limiting , but instead exemplary . other systems , devices , and networks to which embodiments of the present invention are applicable include , but are not limited to , other types of communication and computer devices and systems . more specifically , embodiments are applicable to communication systems , services , and devices such as cell phone networks and compatible devices . in addition , embodiments are applicable to all levels of computing from the personal computer to large network mainframes and servers . brief definitions of terms , abbreviations , and phrases used throughout this application are given below . the terms “ connected ” or “ coupled ” and related terms are used in an operational sense and are not necessarily limited to a direct physical connection or coupling . thus , for example , two devices may be coupled directly , or via one or more intermediary media or devices . as another example , devices may be coupled in such a way that information can be passed there between , while not sharing any physical connection one with another . based on the disclosure provided herein , one of ordinary skill in the art will appreciate a variety of ways in which connection or coupling exists in accordance with the aforementioned definition . the phrases “ in one embodiment ,” “ according to one embodiment ,” and the like generally mean the particular feature , structure , or characteristic following the phrase is included in at least one embodiment of the present invention , and may be included in more than one embodiment of the present invention . importantly , such phases do not necessarily refer to the same embodiment . the phrase “ linking object ” generally refers to one or more commands embedded within or otherwise associated with a document , which when accessed / activated by a user , automatically connects to a designated resource . in one embodiment , linking objects are embedded within certain electronic messages , such as spam , to provide recipients of such messages an easy mechanism for reporting spam to an anti - spam system . in one embodiment , a linking object may be activated by selecting the linking object with a single action of a user input device , such as a single click of a mouse . in other embodiments , a linking object may request additional information from the user such as if the user desires the sender to be placed on a whitelist , a blacklist , and / or the like . according to some embodiments , linking objects may be implemented using various available methods . for example , in one embodiment , a linking object may be a uri embedded in an email message . in some embodiments , a linking object may be implemented using an embedded java script , an executable file , a visual basic script and the like . if the specification states a component or feature “ may ”, “ can ”, “ could ”, or “ might ” be included or have a characteristic , that particular component or feature is not required to be included or have the characteristic . the term “ spam ” generally refers to the abuse of any electronic communications medium to send unsolicited messages in bulk . in one embodiment , the term “ spam ” refers to an unsolicited and unwanted message that is delivered via e - mail . in other embodiments , the term “ spam ” includes unwanted , unsolicited messages in a variety of communication media formats . examples of common communication media include , but are not limited to , e - mail , instant messaging , usenet newsgroup , wikis , guestbooks , web search engines , weblogs , mobile phone text messaging , and / or the like . fig1 illustrates a flowchart 100 describing the method of marking spam and user submission of messages in accordance with various embodiments of the present invention . according to one embodiment , an anti - spam system may be configured to scan incoming emails and determine which messages , if any , should be identified and marked as spam . in step 10 , a determination is made whether the message is spam . if not , the message passes through 16 to the user as per the usual process . if the message is spam , it is marked as spam 12 and a uri ( universal resource identifier ) is inserted 14 into the message . this uri may be located in the subject area or in the body of the email message . the email is then passed on 16 to the user . in some embodiments , another type of linking object such as a java script , executable file , and / or the like may be inserted into the message . when the user receives the marked message , the email can then be submitted to the anti - spam system by clicking on the link provided by the uri or other linking object . according to some embodiments , the uri , or other linking object , may contain all the necessary information and instructions for contacting the anti - spam system . for example , in one embodiment , a single click of the mouse is all the input required from the user . as such , no additional information needs to be memorized or submitted by the user . according to one embodiment , the uri , or linking object , may be encoded with a reference to the original email included as an attachment to the email sent by the uri , or linking object . in one embodiment , the linking object may be encoded with information including the server address information in order to retrieve the original email directly from the original server . alternatively , in some embodiments , the uri , or linking object , can contain only the signatures from the email or similar information deemed necessary for spam analysis . using this latter method has the additional advantage of preserving the privacy of the content of the original email . generally , the need for user input in an anti - spam system is to identify false positives , i . e . email messages marked as spam which are not such . fig2 illustrates a block diagram 200 showing a network for tracking email messages in accordance with one or more embodiments of the present invention . in accordance with various embodiments , a submission method , such as a single - click submission method , may be incorporated into a complete email tracking system . the first element is the uri , or linking object , insertion device 20 . in one embodiment , the linking object insertion device may be configured to encode a linking object , such as a uri , and insert the linking object into a marked electronic message , such as an email . according to one embodiment , this device may be incorporated into an email server , a firewall with email scanning capabilities , communication servers or , more generally , any anti - spam device or system that is capable of scanning electronic messages , such as email messages , and detecting which ones are spam . in accordance with the embodiment depicted , an email submission server 22 to receive email submissions from users who click on the uri may also be provided . in one embodiment , server 22 may be the destination address encoded into the uri . however , as described below , server 22 may also have additional functions . in some embodiments , the full electronic message or data may be submitted for analysis . for example , if a full email message is to be submitted for analysis , then an email storage server 24 is also required . this server keeps an archive of all emails that have had uris , or linking object , inserted into them by the insertion device 20 . the email submission server 22 can then retrieve the full email message from the email storage server 24 when the corresponding email is received from the user . in other embodiments , digital signatures of the electronic message or data may be submitted . for example , if only email signatures are collected , then the email storage server 24 is not necessary . fig2 also depicts an email client workstation 26 . this workstation is where the user runs their email client , such as microsoft outlook ®. according to one embodiment , when the user receives a message that is falsely identified as spam , or requires further analysis , they click on the uri , or linking object embedded within the message , and submit an email to the email submission server 22 . while the email client workstation 26 forms a part of the whole system according to one embodiment , it will typically be provided by the user and not the anti - spam system provider . for practical purposes , according to one embodiment , the email storage server 24 can be combined with the insertion device 20 into a single device . according to some embodiments , insertion device 20 may be implemented in hardware , software , and / or a combination thereof . furthermore , insertion device 20 may be associated and / or implemented at a variety of levels . for example , insertion device 20 may be implemented by an enterprise , a communications service provider , an end user , and / or the like . while the above description uses the single - click submission method for detecting spam email messages , it can be effectively used for any application where any electronic message , such as an email message , or its signatures needs to be submitted to a system for analysis . for example , an anti - virus system can insert a uri , or linking object , into a quarantined email if a virus is present . according to one embodiment , the uri may provide a link for the user to review the email in a protected environment , to release the message from quarantine or to provide feedback to the anti - virus system . also , while some applications ( and even some anti - spam applications ) may require further user input after clicking on the uri , use of the single - click method is still beneficial . by minimizing the user &# 39 ; s steps to initiate the process , the likelihood of the user proceeding with the process and providing the necessary information is greatly enhanced . embodiments of the present invention include various steps , which have been described above . a variety of these steps may be performed by hardware components or may be embodied in machine - executable instructions , which may be used to cause a general - purpose or special - purpose processor programmed with the instructions to perform the steps . alternatively , the steps may be performed by a combination of hardware , software , and / or firmware . as such , fig3 is an example of a computer system 300 with which embodiments of the present invention may be utilized . according to the present example , the computer system includes a bus 31 , at least one processor 32 , at least one communication port 33 , a main memory 34 , a removable storage media 35 a read only memory 36 , and a mass storage 37 . processor ( s ) 32 can be any know processor , such as , but not limited to , an intel ® itanium ® or itanium 2 ® processor ( s ), or amd ® opteron ® or athlon mp ® processor ( s ), or motorola ® lines of processors . communication port ( s ) 33 can be any of an rs - 232 port for use with a modem based dialup connection , a 10 / 100 ethernet port , or a gigabit port using copper or fiber . communication port ( s ) 33 may be chosen depending on a network such a local area network ( lan ), wide area network ( wan ), or any network to which the computer system 300 connects . main memory 34 can be random access memory ( ram ), or any other dynamic storage device ( s ) commonly known in the art . read only memory 36 can be any static storage device ( s ) such as programmable read only memory ( prom ) chips for storing static information such as instructions for processor 32 . mass storage 37 can be used to store information and instructions . for example , hard disks such as the adaptec ® family of scsi drives , an optical disc , an array of disks such as raid , such as the adaptec family of raid drives , or any other mass storage devices may be used . bus 31 communicatively couples processor ( s ) 32 with the other memory , storage and communication blocks . bus 31 can be a pci / pci - x or scsi based system bus depending on the storage devices used . removable storage media 35 can be any kind of external hard - drives , floppy drives , iomega ® zip drives , compact disc - read only memory ( cd - rom ), compact disc - re - writable ( cd - rw ), digital video disk - read only memory ( dvd - rom ). the components described above are meant to exemplify some types of possibilities . in no way should the aforementioned examples limit the scope of the invention , as they are only exemplary embodiments . in conclusion , embodiments of the present invention provide novel systems , methods and arrangements for tracking electronic messages . while detailed descriptions of one or more embodiments of the invention have been given above , various alternatives , modifications , and equivalents will be apparent to those skilled in the art without varying from the spirit of the invention . therefore , the above description should not be taken as limiting the scope of the invention , which is defined by the appended claims .