Introduction to MailWatch

MailWatch provides a view of the MailScanner anti-spam and anti-virus filter that runs on the server. You can see messages that have been blocked, run reports on mail filtering and delivery, and release messages that have been incorrectly bloicked.

MailScanner keeps a copy of any message that it blocks for up to 30 days. This gives you a reasonable amount of time to release any blocked messages that may actually have been incorrectly identified as spam.

Logging in to MailWatch

Anyone can reach this documentation screen, but you need to log in to view and use MailWatch. You use your email address and network logon password to log in, for example jbloggs@mydomainname.co.nz. Please contact Egressive to give staff access to MailWatch.

Checking for blocked messages

The colour codes at the top of the screen show you how MailScanner has identified each message.

• Clean messages (grey) are just passed straight through to the recipient - no copy is kept by MailScanner
• Suspected spam (pink) are also passed through to the recipient, but the subject of the message is altered to indicate MailScanner thinks this is spam. No copy is kept in quarantine.
• High Spam messages (red) are blocked, and saved in quarantine. These are messages that MailScanner is sure are spam messages - but very occaisionally they will actually be valid mesaages. To release a message incorrectly shown as high spam, see below.
• Bad Content/Infected (very dark red) are messages that either have a virus in them, or MailScanner suspects that they may have a phishing exploit or a dangerous attachment included. Sometimes genuine messages with a valid attachment are caught by MailScanner in this way. To release a message incorrectly shown as high spam, see below.
• Whitelisted messages (green) are messages that have been configured to go through the filters no matter what MailScanner thinks. An example is messages that you release from quarantine.
• Blacklisted messages (black) are messages from sites or senders that have been set to be always blocked. Blacklists are useful for nuisance senders.
• MCP stands for message content protection and is not used at this site

Releasing blocked messages

For messages that MailScanner suspects contain bad content the recipient and the sender) will be informed by MailScanner that the message or some of the attachments have been blocked. In other cases, someone will be expecting a message that never arrives. In these cases, you can use MailWatch to check and see whether the message has indeed been quarantined.

Noone is notified if messages are identified as spam (due to the volume of spam and also to ensure the spammer does not get confirmation that they have found a valid email address).

To release a blocked message,

1. Look for the message in question in the Recent Messages list (the screen you see when you first log in). The Recent Messages screen only doisplays that last 50 messages. If the message you are looking for is older than this, you will need to go into the Quarantine area by clicking on the Quarantine menu and then click on the day that the message would have been received.
2. If you cannot find the message, it is most likely that the server never received the message. There are also some anti-spam checks performed before MailScanner receives the message, and these reject badly formed mail messages or messages from incorrectly set up mail servers (a common way of identifying spammers).
3. Once you have found the message, hold your mouse pointer between the [ ] on the left of the line of the message.
4. Go to the bottom of the information page that is now being displayed.
5. Click the release box for any part of the message that youi want to release. To send to another recipient, also click the Alternate Recipient(s): box, and enter another email address in the box on the right.
6. Press the submit button at the bottom right of the screen.
7. The message will now be delivered to the appropriate recipients

General Notes

• The totals for today are in the box at the top right of the screen. You can expect anywhere from 50% to 80% of your messages to be rejected as spam, depending on how many spammers' mailing lists the oprganisation's staff are unlucky enough to be on.
• There are a number of reports available under the Reports menu. Most of these are more of interest for the administration of the server, but feel free to browse through them in case you find some of them useful.