Freepages-Help-L Archives

Archiver > Freepages-Help > 2001-12 > 1007258304


From: Betty Mitchell <>
Subject: [FreeHelp] Re: Freepages-Help-D Digest V01 #434
Date: Sat, 01 Dec 2001 20:58:24 -0500
References: <200112012316.fB1NGos11822@lists7.rootsweb.com>


I have Norton AntiVirus and Norton Personal Firewall. No matter how I set the
preferences for scanning AOL mail, Norton AntiVirus will not scan AOL mail. When
you look into your setup for the mail programs scanned, AOL is dimmed. You can
select it as many times, in as many ways as you want, and it won't scan the AOL
mail.

The best thing to do is either get off AOL or have your mail forwarded to a real
ISP. I connect to ISP via TCP/IP and do not give out any AOL addresses.

If AOL is your primary connection to the internet, then you can configure Norton
Antivirus and it's automatic update to work with AOL 5 and up. See the Customer
Service area of Symantec at: http://www.symantec.com/techsupp/
Betty

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Betty Naff Mitchell
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> -----------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Subject: Re: [FreeHelp] Anti-Virus Programs and AOL
> Date: Sat, 1 Dec 2001 15:56:44 -0600
> From: "Robert W Fay" <>
> To:
>
> On 30 Nov 2001, at 19:39 <> wrote:
>
> Hi Cindy,
>
> > I contacted a technical support person at AOL and McAfee (one person at
> > each place), and they both told me the same thing: There is no AV
> > program that will scan AOL email (much to my shock....
> Well, I'm not proficient in AOL but I am quite familiar with McAfee and
> it baffles me why they would say this. A malicious executable code
> included as an attachment to an AOL email is not encrypted, not zipped,
> not anything that would seem to defeat McAfee. I might suggest you try
> setting up McAfee with download scan to monitor your email, then send
> yourself the EICAR test virus. Also, try inquiring of the AV company
> experts.at alt.comp.virus on USENET. There are way too many AOL
> customers for AV companies to ignore their AV needs.
>
> To make a long story short, for AOL

> > users, it seems to boil down to this: it is best to set your
> > preferences so that what you download is not opened automatically (IF
> > you decide to download an attachment, that is); download it, then scan
> > it before you open it.
> >
> > AOL's criteria for its users prior to downloading anything is: Do you
> > 'know' who sent you this (whatever it is)? If you click on "yes" it
> > downloads; if you click on "no", it doesn't download. It just seems to
> > me that whether or not I "know" someone does not seem to be the best
> > guideline (most people writing me at my website, I don't know).

> This is really kind of a pathetic excuse by AOL. If nothing else, try

> ZoneAlarm Pro version firewall. It will directly block 37 known virus
> extensions right out of the box and you can add more. Thats a big
> improvement over the "do you know them?" thing.
>
> Bob Fay

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