Office XP SP3 breaks 3rd-party junk email filter

From: Mark Medici (mark_at_DBMA.COM)
Date: 03/11/04

  • Next message: Mark Medici: "Re: Office XP SP3 breaks 3rd-party junk email filter" 
    Date:         Thu, 11 Mar 2004 10:55:16 -0500
To: NTBUGTRAQ@LISTSERV.NTBUGTRAQ.COM

    I have two customers who have called complaining that since installing
    Office XP SP3 their junk email filter has, essentially, been rendered
    useless. Both are using Microsoft Office XP Outlook with Sunbelt
    Software's "iHateSpam" client software for junk email filtering.
    Sunbelt Software is aware of the problem, but currently has no solution
    (see http://www.sunbelt-software.com/ihs/wizard/officexp-sp3.htm).

    Each new email generates a dialog "A program is trying to access e-mail
    addresses you have stored in Outlook. Do you want to allow this? If
    this is unexpected, it may be a virus and you should choose 'No.'"
    Unfortunately, there is no indication of what program is accessing
    Outlook, leaving the user to make an arbitrary and potentially dangerous
    assumption about the origin of the access. Sunbelt-Software recommends
    a free program, "Express ClickYes" to work-around the issue. I don't
    know anything about that company or software, so I don't know if it's
    reliable and safe to install (see
    http://www.express-soft.com/mailmate/clickyes.html).

    One customer receives over 200 junk emails a day. iHateSpam was
    effectively filtering 98% prior to Office XP SP3. Now, the resulting
    pop-up messages have rendered his system unusable, with the security
    dialogs creating a de facto denial-of-service situation on this desktop.
    The obvious solution is to uninstall iHateSpam, but then he still has
    the 200+ junk email a day to contend with.

    Questions:

    Has anyone else observed similar problems with other client-based junk
    email filters in conjunction with Microsoft Office XP Outlook and SP3?

    What client-based junk email filters for MS-Outlook (Exchange MAPI mode)
    are not affected by Office XP SP3?

    Is the separate Outlook patch MS04-009 the cause of this problem, or is
    it limited to installing Office XP SP3?

    Is there some way to uninstall Office XP SP3? Microsoft says no, and
    there's nothing in add/remove programs, but maybe someone knows a
    "secret" short of uninstall/reinstall.

    Does anyone have any experience with Express ClickYes?

    -- Mark

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  • Next message: Mark Medici: "Re: Office XP SP3 breaks 3rd-party junk email filter"

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