Free Email Security Check

It is of vital importance for administrators and users to keep email security up-to-date. Byteplant's free Email Security Check is intended to help you with this task.

Check Your Email Security Now!

On this page, you can request a set of sample messages to be delivered to an email address of your choice. These messages can be used to perform a basic test if your mail filtering setup is working. Keep in mind that if only one of these test mails reaches you, you should take immediate action to protect yourself.

Email Filtering

There are three steps of filtering that every mail should be subjected to:

• Attachment filters are used to block executable attachments, such as .exe files. A long list of other attachment types are also executable. Of late, exploits in image processing libraries have been made public. This allows spreading viruses using image files, such as gif or jpg. Attachment filters require little processing and little maintenance (they are always up-to-date, but you must make sure you block all attachment types used as virus carrier). However, they are ineffective if a virus author uses a more complex method of spreading the infection by wrapping the virus into an archive file, e.g. a zip archive (unless you choose to block archives as well).
• Virus filters are used to scan all attachments for known viruses. The virus database must be constantly updated to reliably detect the latest threats. As the update of virus filter databases lags behind, there is a window of vulnerability where viruses can pass undetected into users' mailboxes. By blocking executable attachments, an attachment blocker can close this window, to a point: Users must still be instructed to be very careful with the content of archive files that passed both the attachment blocker and the virus checker.
• Finally, most mail traffic nowadays is spam. Good spam filters are able to capture about 90% of all spam mails, while at the same time false positives (a legitimate mail incorrectly flagged as spam) are very rare.

CleanMail offers complete email security by protecting your organization against virus and spam attacks. Click here to learn more about CleanMail's email security features.

Description of the Test Mails

There are seven test mails our server will try to deliver to you.

• One mail contains a harmless executable attachment. Even though it is harmless, it should be removed (or replaced) by your attachment blocker. Depending on the configuration of your attachment blocker, this mail may never reach you.
• Another mail contains a harmless executable attachment, the EICAR anti virus test file in a .zip archive. This file should be detected by every virus checker. Depending on the configuration of your virus checker, this mail may never reach you.
• Yet another mail is harmless spam (GTUBE spam signature), and should be detected by every spam filter. Depending on the configuration of your spam filter, this mail may never reach you.
• The remaining four mails contain attachments disguised in different ways. Even though the attachments are harmless, they should be removed (or replaced) by your attachment blocker. Depending on the configuration of your attachment blocker, these mails may never reach you.