email virus protection

The most common method by which viruses are spread among Berkeley Lab computers is by email. There are now hundreds of viruses that infect Microsoft Word documents. When these documents are exchanged via email (or any other means), the virus spreads. One of the most egregious culprits is a variant of the Klez worm, which hides the real sender of the virus by inserting random addresses in the "From" line gleaned from address lists and other files of infected systems. Also see the Virus Archive Page for a list of some of the more notorious email viruses.

Since early 1998, we have been automatically scanning for viruses all email that passes through the Lab's main email gateways (lbl.gov as well as other CITG-maintained SMTP gateways). We call this virus protection software on our email servers the "VirusWall." The VirusWall is automatically updated, and checks for new virus signatures every hour. This VirusWall software scans all email sent to your Lab email address (FMLastname@lbl.gov) and REMOVES any viruses in it before sending it on to you. describes the lbl.gov email-VirusWall software.

Therefore, you may received email with messages in them that the VirusWall indicating that the VirusWall has REMOVED such viruses from that email, so that you are aware that the message contained a virus and was cleaned.

Unfortunately, we've recently seen a significant increase in the number of viruses being sent via email. Many modern viruses send copies of themselves _automatically_, usually without the knowledge of the person whose computer is infected. To make matters worse, the viruses often FORGE the "From" address to disguise the actual sending computer, and they obtain email addresses from a variety of sources on infected computers. The email-VirusWall DOES remove such viruses/worms from BOTH incoming and outgoing mail.

See for information on the very troublesome worms and viruses that FORGE email.

Some email anti-virus protective measures you should take:

• Only email that goes through the lbl.gov gateway is checked. So you should encourage anyone who sends you email enclosures to use your "@lbl.gov" address. Also, you should use "@lbl.gov" addresses whenever you send email enclosures to your colleagues at the Lab. In addition, you should make smtp.lbl.gov your outgoing mail server.


• A general rule of thumb is that if you don't know the sender, or think there is something suspicious about an email message, go ahead and delete it, or call the Help Desk (486-HELP) for assistance.


• Make sure you have anti-virus software on your computer, and that the virus signature file is updated. The Lab provides anti-virus software for free to all staff, and that software has the ability to automatically update its virus signature files.


• See for information on how to install and configure the Lab-supplied anti-virus software
  Please contact the Help Desk if you need assistance with downloading or setting up Lab-supplied anti-virus software, or verifying that it's already installed.

© Copyright 2001 Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory Page Owner:  help@lbl.gov