scanning outlook msgs for spam filtering ...like norton does

[jerryk]

Sorry if this isn't a perfect fit for the API forum...It seemed the closest!

As an exercise for my newest language (java), I'd like to attempt to make a client side spam filter/blocker that grabs mail when outlook/express loads ...in the same way Norton Antivirus does.

With Norton, your Outlook pop3 server settings become "Pop.Norton.Antivirus", and then **somehow** Norton gets a peek at the message before Outlook does.

Could any of you guess how this process works, and how I might borrow the idea for my filter? Does Norton have it's own pop3 client running in the background? (ugly for me to develop) ...and Once Norton approves a message, are there OLE tools to pass the message along to Outlook?

I'm not looking for a howto, but if any of you have hints or general ideas I'd be most grateful!

Thanks, jerry

 

[terosoft]

I think you're almost correct in your assumption.
For what I can see NAV installs a kind of pop&smtp proxy server, so Outlook asks NAV for the messages and NAV retrieves them, checks for virus & spam and if all it's clean it delivers them to Outlook.

The same for SMTP: Outlook sends the message to NAV where it's checked for infections and if the message is clean NAV sends it.

Gerardo Czajkowski

 

[jerryk]

After thinking about it, I'm going to lower my standards and just have my app check the pop3 server every couple minutes....like other client side apps.

I might go with the "outlook handoff" idea after that.