An Improved Dandelion Optimizer Algorithm for Spam Detection: Next-Generation Email Filtering System

Abstract

Spam emails have become a pervasive issue in recent years, as internet users receive increasing amounts of unwanted or fake emails. To combat this issue, automatic spam detection methods have been proposed, which aim to classify emails into spam and non-spam categories. Machine learning techniques have been utilized for this task with considerable success. In this paper, we introduce a novel approach to spam email detection by presenting significant advancements to the Dandelion Optimizer (DO) algorithm. The DO is a relatively new nature-inspired optimization algorithm inspired by the flight of dandelion seeds. While the DO shows promise, it faces challenges, especially in high-dimensional problems such as feature selection for spam detection. Our primary contributions focus on enhancing the DO algorithm. Firstly, we introduce a new local search algorithm based on flipping (LSAF), designed to improve the DO’s ability to find the best solutions. Secondly, we propose a reduction equation that streamlines the population size during algorithm execution, reducing computational complexity. To showcase the effectiveness of our modified DO algorithm, which we refer to as the Improved DO (IDO), we conduct a comprehensive evaluation using the Spam base dataset from the UCI repository. However, we emphasize that our primary objective is to advance the DO algorithm, with spam email detection serving as a case study application. Comparative analysis against several popular algorithms, including Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO), the Genetic Algorithm (GA), Generalized Normal Distribution Optimization (GNDO), the Chimp Optimization Algorithm (ChOA), the Grasshopper Optimization Algorithm (GOA), Ant Lion Optimizer (ALO), and the Dragonfly Algorithm (DA), demonstrates the superior performance of our proposed IDO algorithm. It excels in accuracy, fitness, and the number of selected features, among other metrics. Our results clearly indicate that the IDO overcomes the local optima problem commonly associated with the standard DO algorithm, owing to the incorporation of LSAF and the reduction in equation methods. In summary, our paper underscores the significant advancement made in the form of the IDO algorithm, which represents a promising approach for solving high-dimensional optimization problems, with a keen focus on practical applications in real-world systems. While we employ spam email detection as a case study, our primary contribution lies in the improved DO algorithm, which is efficient, accurate, and outperforms several state-of-the-art algorithms in various metrics. This work opens avenues for enhancing optimization techniques and their applications in machine learning.