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Sanitizer to be removed from mail.msu.edu Mail.msu.edu has a feature called the "Sanitizer" which is intended to help prevent infection by viruses and other malicious software. On March 5, 2005, we will remove the Sanitizer feature from Mail.msu.edu. Background: the Sanitizer was implemented when mail.msu.edu was launched in order to provide basic defense against viruses. The Sanitizer inspects attachments and looks for file types that potentially might be harmful. Customers tell us that the Sanitizer is not useful because it renames many harmless attachments. Mail.msu.edu uses the ClamAV anti-virus software to inspect all incoming mail for known virus threats. ClamAV uses signatures to identify specific known threats and to block them before delivery to the user. Experience has shown ClamAV to be quite effective. The mail team has learned that the Sanitizer is consuming substantial CPU resources even though only a fraction of users have the feature turned on. In effect, we are paying twice for CPU to inspect mail for viruses. Since the Sanitizer is resource-intensive, relatively ineffective, and duplicative, we have decided to remove the feature. This will free resources for other improvements customers have suggested, such as blocking unwanted mail by domain. Current users of mail.msu.edu who have the Sanitizer turned on will receive individual e-mails with this notice. They do not need to take any action. On March 5 the functionality will be removed and the Sanitizer option on the Preferences screen will be removed. -- m. kolb <[log in to unmask]>