[Mimedefang] MIMEDefang 2.40 is released

[David F. Skoll]

On Mon, 8 Mar 2004, Josh Kelley wrote:

> Again, I'd like to know why the recommendation in MIMEDefang 2.40 was
> changed from action_bounce to action_discard.

I'm on the fence on this question.  On the one hand, there's clearly
something repugnant about silently discarding mail.  On the other, when
I see some of our clients receiving hundreds of thousands of viruses per
day, I realize there's something repugnant about causing hundreds of
thousands of useless bounces (because some of those viruses do come from
real SMTP servers, not just virus SMTP engines.)

On balance (at least, this week!), I think it's kinder to the Internet
to simply discard viruses.  The risk of a false-positive with virus
detection is very low, much lower than with spam, so I think it's
reasonably safe.

But all I can do is recommend policy, not dictate it.  If, after careful
consideration, you still prefer action_bounce, by all means use it.

Regards,

David.