Mailscanner - HELP!

[Ajarn Philip]

I regularly receive emails with files attached (for translation), sometimes in a zip file, often not. I've never had a problem until today, when the attachment was replaced by a message:

This is a message from the MailScanner E-Mail Virus Protection Service
----------------------------------------------------------------------
The original e-mail attachment "xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx.zip"
is on the list of unacceptable attachments for this site and has been
replaced by this warning message.

If you wish to receive a copy of the original attachment, please
e-mail helpdesk and include the whole of this message
in your request. Alternatively, you can call them, with
the contents of this message to hand when you call.

At Thu Aug 7 08:09:25 2008 the virus scanner said:
MailScanner: Attempt to hide real filename extension (xxxxxxxxxxx.xls.ttx)

Note to Help Desk: Look on the tot-site () MailScanner in /var/spool/MailScanner/quarantine/20080807 (message xxxxxxxxxx).

I've hunted around, and this would appear to be due to the double suffix (xls.ttx). I use 2 addresses, yahoo.co.uk and aol.co.uk. Neither have a 'helpdesk' I can contact directly, nor is any particular help desk specified in the message.

The email was sent again with the same result. How can I get the original attachment, and how can I stop this happening again? The current attachment is in a zip file, and, in the meantime, I've asked for the 2 relevant files to be extracted and sent separately.

Any advice would be much appreciated.

[Ajarn Philip]

Incidentally, the unzipped files arrived with no problems.

[Jo]

We have this sometimes at work - some organisations' mail servers won't accept .zip files. Get your sender to rename it to a .zi (or anything else) before sending, and then rename back to .zip on receipt. Bit of a faff, but should do it.

[Tim_MaA_MidB]

In a similar vein, a policeman friend of mine in America cannot read webpages about the Amazon which (or that?) include reference the the Rio Negro. Computers are still only as clever as the people that program them.

[Ajarn Philip]

A little research suggests it's more likely to do with the fact that the double-suffixed file was 'hidden' inside a zip file. What I can't work out is who is using MailScanner - Yahoo and Aol or my Thai ISP? And why has it only just kicked in, as I haven't changed a thing for at least 8 months? Yahoo and AOL don't have a 'help desk' directly contactable by email (Can't really blame 'em, they'd be inundated ).

My father would have loved PCs and the Internet. Wish I was more like him!

[matthew]

A little research suggests it's more likely to do with the fact that the double-suffixed file was 'hidden' inside a zip file. What I can't work out is who is using MailScanner - Yahoo and Aol or my Thai ISP? And why has it only just kicked in, as I haven't changed a thing for at least 8 months? Yahoo and AOL don't have a 'help desk' directly contactable by email (Can't really blame 'em, they'd be inundated ).

I'd guess the sender's end. They probably *do* have a help desk that would be able to explain what's going on.

It's good practice for messages like that to include something that identifies which system generated it, but that doesn't seem to have happened here.