Allow winmail.dat attachment

[Jan-Peter Koopmann]

On Friday, May 21, 2004 1:34 PM Brendan Chard <mailto:chardlist at CHARD.NET> wrote:

> I have a number of outlook users and I'm getting some
> complaints since MS is blocking the winmail.dat file that is
> generated by Outlook's Rich Text format.  

I know this is not what you want to hear but there is no real reason for RTF mails anymore. Why do they really demand this?

> What's the best way
> to allow MS to let Outlook Rich Text e-mails get through?

Enable TNEF scanning in MailScanner. I use the internal version which seems slower but has proven more compatible with the Microsoft stuff. How is your MS blocking winmail.dat? Mine isn't... What is the message generated? Log entries? 

> What are the risks in doing this?  I don't know of any
> viruses that send themselves out in rich text format, could
> that be right around the corner?

You need to decode the TNEF stuff first and then run all tests against that. MS is quite capable of doing so. Sometimes Microsoft uses strange winmail.dat formats which used to cause the external TNEF decoder to screw up. Never had trouble with the internal though. Other than that I personally do not see anything dangerous in winmail.dats.

Regards,
  JP

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