will Avast also protect networked PC's ?

[Goner]

just wondering ; on the server running Avast i'm also running FreeProxy to allow client PC's in my network to access the Internet for http, pop3 & smtp.
i enabled e-mail checking and see that ashmaisv.exe (avast! e-Mail Scanner Service) is using port 110 & 25 (pop3 & smtp), so i wondered : if a client PC retrieves/sends mail with a virus, will Avast catch it ??

Goner

[Eddy]

What version of Avast are you using?
What server os are you using?
What os's is/are on the client(s)?

[Goner]

Avast 4.1.418 Home edition
server OS : Windows 2000 Pro SP4
client OS : Windows 98 SE, Windows 2000 Pro SP4, Linux Mandrake 9.2
 

[vojtech]

The mail scanner will not check mail unless you correctly configure it. Clients have to be configured to send/receive through mail scanner and the mail scanner has to be configured to accept connections from clients and to forward data to your proxy, see details in the help.

[Goner]

OK, i will look into it !!
Avast already scans Mozilla mail (set up with Mail Wizard) and TheBat! mail (thru the plugin), but i did not see anything about networked PC's ...

btw ; does that work on the Home edition or do i need the Pro for this ??

[Eddy]

Put the server edition on your server and your entire network will be protected.

[Goner]

hadn't looked at that one (maybe because of the $399 price tag) ...

oh wait, there's an Exchange and SMTP Server edition ... but i don't use Exchange. so what happens with incoming POP3 mail ??

[Eddy]

You can put Avast (preferably pro) on the server and run scans from there on the other machines. I think this is allowed. If you can setup Pro so that it scans all mails handled by the mail server on your server comp, it should protect all emails. I think this is possible and easy to do. I can be mistaken, but I'm sure someone will correct me on this if I am.

Remember that Avast (home and Pro) do not work on server os's.

[Goner]

ah, but i do not have a real mail server ! i do not collect all mail on a central server and then distribute it to client PC's ...

i'm running a proxy program that allows networked PC's to retrieve mail through the server (a Windows 2000 Pro machine) ... because the proxy program gets the mail from the various POP3 servers through the standard port 110 and because Avast is scanning that port, i was hoping that it would also catch contaminated e-mails for/from networked PC's ...

i will check the mail scanner config as 'vojtech' suggested.

[Goner]

Clients have to be configured to send/receive through mail scanner and the mail scanner has to be configured to accept connections from clients and to forward data to your proxy, see details in the help.

where can i set this all up ?? has it to be done manually in avast4.ini ??

edit : found it in the help file ... going to try to set it up using PopListen, SmtpListen & Trust.
if i understand correctly, i will not even have to use my proxy program anymore ; Avast will be proxy & scanner.

[Goner]

OK, it works ...  
i can now send and retrieve mail from a networked PC thru Avast on the server connected to the Internet.

the only thing that does not seem to work is this :
"However, if the login name is Ann.Jones#pop3.tiscali.com, the Mail scanner will connect to the server pop3.tiscali.com and it will download the mail for the user Ann.Jones."

when i specify the servername, Avast still tries to connect to DefaultPopServer ...

[Eddy]

I'm not sure on this one, but I think Avast scans mail that comes from a server and doesn't care about for what user the mail is. Perhaps someone else pops in and is able to tell more.

Anyway, it is nice to hear that it is working

[Goner]

the problem is that when i specify 'username@pop3server' on the networked PC, Avast on the server still uses the DefaultPopServer and DefaultSmtpServer ... the help-fle says that 'pop3server' should be used !?

i 'solved' it by changing the default servers, but now Mozilla mail on the servers doesn't work any more :-(

might be a bug ....
anyone here  who uses Avast as a scanner/proxy on a server to check/send mail from networked PC's

[vojtech]

Correct username format is 'username#pop3server', not 'username@pop3server'.

[Goner]

oops, slip of the finger ... i was using "username#pop3server".
i'll see if i can make some screenshots of what is happening ...