Why Is Antispam And Bayesian Filtering Running In Antivirus 2009?

I would like to turn of the Bayesian filtering and antispam in Antivirus 2009. It specifies on the box that AntiSpam is NOT included but it is actually running and marking emails as SPAM. If I wanted this feature I would have purchased the product that includes it. Why is this running and how do I turn it off in AV 2009?


I have emailed support 3 times and called 3 times. I get no reply in 2 weeks to the email and the 3rd time I called it wasn't busy so the "tech" tried to get me to turn off virus scanning for email. I explained that was not what I wanted. I want to remove/disable spam filtering. He said he would send an email to me immediately so I could provide more information for their engineers. Never got that email. I handle antispam at the server and do not want this added feature wasting resources on the client computers. This issue did not exist in AV 2009. To verify this issue you can simply look at the email headers and see your BitDefender bayesian filter score for every incoming email.

Comments

  • troppmann
    edited October 2008
    I would like to turn of the Bayesian filtering and antispam in Antivirus 2009. It specifies on the box that AntiSpam is NOT included but it is actually running and marking emails as SPAM. If I wanted this feature I would have purchased the product that includes it. Why is this running and how do I turn it off in AV 2009?


    I have emailed support 3 times and called 3 times. I get no reply in 2 weeks to the email and the 3rd time I called it wasn't busy so the "tech" tried to get me to turn off virus scanning for email. I explained that was not what I wanted. I want to remove/disable spam filtering. He said he would send an email to me immediately so I could provide more information for their engineers. Never got that email. I handle antispam at the server and do not want this added feature wasting resources on the client computers. This issue did not exist in AV 2009. To verify this issue you can simply look at the email headers and see your BitDefender bayesian filter score for every incoming email.


    i have the same issue and would like this turned off as well....anyone? i can tell what is spam thank you very much....dont need all my emails tagged....

  • ... This issue did not exist in AV 2009...
    I didn't see an edit feature. I meant to post that the AntiSpam/Bayesian Filtering did not exist in Antivirus 2008.
  • Hello Ann T. Virus and troppmann,


    Are you using outlook? If so that includes also a spam and phising filter. That filter can also add spam as tag.


    Kind regards,


    Niels

  • Hello Ann T. Virus and troppmann,


    Are you using outlook? If so that includes also a spam and phising filter. That filter can also add spam as tag.


    Kind regards,


    Niels


    thanks for the response....i dont have that on actually...and in 2007 i dont see any option to adjust that....google doesnt either....

  • Hello Ann T. Virus and troppmann,


    Are you using outlook? If so that includes also a spam and phising filter. That filter can also add spam as tag.


    Kind regards,


    Niels

    Niels, I know you try to help but sometimes it seems you don't read the entire post before responding. Also, it appears your knowledge of Outlook might be lacking. Outlook uses a folder system not a header/subject re-write system. It moves flagged items to the "junk email" folder. There are many 3rd party add-ons for Outlook that re-write the headers and the subject, just like BitDefender does though. If you re-read my original post I stated that you can verify this by looking at the email headers. Just like most 3rd party email filters Bitdefender clearly marks the header so we know who did the re-write.


    X-BitDefenderWKS-SpamStamp: v1, build 2.7.16.55736, bayes score:
    500(0), pbayes score: 0(0), neunet score: 500(0), total: 0
    X-BitDefenderWKS-Spam: No - 0


    That's an example, I think it's obvious what program wrote that to the email header. If I remove Antivirus 2009 then the header re-writes are gone and I also don't get the occasional subject re-writes. AV 2009 is clearly running antispam without any user controls or interface. The retail box clearly states that it DOES NOT include antispam. I'm sure it wasn't intended but it's false advertising and not what I wanted. Unfortunately you can't use a BitDefender 2009 installation key with the good old BitDefender AV 2008. You can upgrade to 2009 with a 2008 key but you can't go backwards.


    Still no answer to my emails or the promised response to my phone call to support :(

  • Niels
    Niels
    edited October 2008

    Hello Ann T. Virus,


    Did you used in the past BitDefender Internet Security, BitDefender Antvirus plus or BitDefender Total Security? Because that could be a leftover. If you take a look at the manual anti-spam isn't mentioned see here.


    You can verify if antispam is included by going to the installation directory and see if you can find the following files: antispam.dll,antispam.xml if these files are missing than it should be a leftover.


    Kind regards,


    Niels

  • I have just installed BitDefender AntiVirus 2009 and I also see the results of BitDefender spam filtering in my email headers and in the addition of "[spam]" to the subject line of some emails, and I am also upset with this. One of the reasons I chose this product it that it specifically advertised that it does NOT include spam filtering. and I don't want it doing so! I have never had another BitDefender product or trial version on this system BTW.


    I hope there is some way to turn this off.

  • Hello,


    I don't know if this is going to work:


    Press the windows button together with r now type this:


    regsvr32 -u "%ProgramFiles%\BitDefender\BitDefender 2009\antispam.dll" press enter.


    regsvr32 -u "%ProgramFiles%\BitDefender\BitDefender 2009\bdo.dll" press enter


    In outlook 2003 go to:


    Tools | Options | Others | Advanced Options | Com Add-Ins


    See if you can find anything that is located into the BitDefender folder and uncheck it.


    In outlook 2007:


    Tools | Trust Center | Add-Ins | Go


    Me as a normal user can't do much so you need to contact support.


    Kind regards,


    Niels

  • Thank you Niels for that hint; I expect you are on the right track. I have submitted a support request and will post here anything I learn.


    It occurs to me that the worst part of this gaffe (or so I call it) is that there is no UI into it; hence no way to whitelist a sender or declare a message "not spam". I have several inbox rules which depend on the subject line and some of them have already been confused...

  • Hello Ann T. Virus,


    Did you used in the past BitDefender Internet Security, BitDefender Antvirus plus or BitDefender Total Security? Because that could be a leftover. If you take a look at the manual anti-spam isn't mentioned see...


    Kind regards,


    Niels

    I have never owned and will never own Internet Security or Total Security. I only want a minimum foot print product that is an antivirus and an antispyware. It's obvious part of the antispam application is installing with BD AV 2009 and the package clearly states that it IS NOT included.
  • Hello Ann T. Virus,


    You didn't said if you tried my other suggestions that I posted 29 October. You should contact support if it didn't work.


    Kind regards,


    Niels

  • Hello Ann T. Virus,


    You didn't said if you tried my other suggestions that I posted 29 October. You should contact support if it didn't work.


    Kind regards,


    Niels

    As I stated in the first post, I called support and they promised to get back to me but they never did. I also emailed support 3 times and never received a reply.


    As far as trying your other "suggestions", I'm not looking for an unsupported hack that might cause other issues. This should be addressed by the BitDefender engineers.


    Thanks.

  • Hello Ann T. Virus,


    Why would cause my suggestions other issues while the parts I wanted you to disable are only related to BitDefender antispam protection? Can you please explain that.


    Also you said this in your fist post:


    Why is this running and how do I turn it off in AV 2009?


    That is why I responded.


    You can always ask the status of your problem. Normally you received a ticket-id when you contacted support. All what you have to is use liveassistance and ask the status of your ticket id.


    Kind regards,


    Niels

  • Hello Ann T. Virus,


    Why would cause my suggestions other issues while the parts I wanted you to disable are only related to BitDefender antispam protection? Can you please explain that.


    Also you said this in your fist post:


    That is why I responded.


    You can always ask the status of your problem. Normally you received a ticket-id when you contacted support. All what you have to is use liveassistance and ask the status of your ticket id.


    Kind regards,


    Niels

    Notice I asked how to turn it off "in" AV 2009, not how to unregister DLLs. If your suggestion is the recomended solution I think the support staff would have asked me to do that. He did not, and did not give a ticket number. He claimed he was going to eamil me the case number immediately. That never happened. I will be surprised if BitDefender asks thousands of users to unregister DLLs as a solution to a problem they have added to AV 2009. I would expect to see a selection in the advanced properties to disable it. My original question was in hopes that the selector was there and I had overlooked it.
  • troppmann
    edited November 2008
    Notice I asked how to turn it off "in" AV 2009, not how to unregister DLLs. If your suggestion is the recomended solution I think the support staff would have asked me to do that. He did not, and did not give a ticket number. He claimed he was going to eamil me the case number immediately. That never happened. I will be surprised if BitDefender asks thousands of users to unregister DLLs as a solution to a problem they have added to AV 2009. I would expect to see a selection in the advanced properties to disable it. My original question was in hopes that the selector was there and I had overlooked it.


    i opened a case with this...will let you know what happens

  • regsvr32 -u "%ProgramFiles%\BitDefender\BitDefender 2009\antispam.dll"


    regsvr32 -u "%ProgramFiles%\BitDefender\BitDefender 2009\bdo.dll"


    I don't have either of those dll's on my system. I did find a tempting file named antispam.xml, with tempting entries like:


    <ScanSpam>1</ScanSpam>


    <Treshold>7</Treshold>


    <MarkSpamSubject>1</MarkSpamSubject>


    <MarkPhishSubject>1</MarkPhishSubject>


    <EnableBayes>1</EnableBayes>


    ... and being of the "poke and hope" school I tried editing it (I had to boot into safe mode) and changing all those 1's to 0's. But no difference; scanning and subject marking still goes on.


    I've been in correspondence with support, who suggested the usual (knee-jerk?) clean uninstall and reinstall, then asked for a system report. It's been a week and I haven't heard further. But this really seems like a boo-boo that they're going to have to fix.

  • Hello Ann T. Virus,


    Sorry for this very late reply but I do this forum only in my free time.


    If that feature isn't included than there isn't a way by just disabling it. To answer your question on live assistance that aren't always BitDefender technicians but sometimes a firm that follows a logbook so that is why you need to get a ticket-id from that moment a real BitDefender technician will respond. I only wanted to help but it seems that you are just ignoring me. You could have tried it. I now see that the files are missing. Than it's really strange because the dll files should really be there.


    Kind regards,


    Niels


    Hello MKairys,


    Did you provided also a screenshot of the e-mail headers to show them that BitDefender antispam is active?


    Kind regards,


    Niels

  • Today BitDefender support sent me the following:


    The Antispam will be removed from the Antivirus 2009 in an update on Monday. Now, the .dll file that is in charge with the context menu is called bdshelxt.dll located in C:\Program Files\BitDefender\BitDefender 2009. The command to disable it is: regsvr32 /u bdshelxt.dll.


    I unregistered it on my system but my email is still being scanned, according to the headers; so we'll see what Monday brings.

  • As of this morning (actually as of sometime after 11 PM EST last night) I am not seeing BitDefender scan logs in my message headers. :rolleyes:

  • It turned out that fix was only temporary. About two weeks later they came up with the definitive fix, as follows:


    In order to remove the Antispam plugin please reboot the PC in Safe Mode and then go to C:\Program Files\BitDefender\BitDefender 2009. Here look for bdsmtpp.dll and bdpop3p.dll. Rename their extension into .d__.

  • It turned out that fix was only temporary. About two weeks later they came up with the definitive fix, as follows:


    In order to remove the Antispam plugin please reboot the PC in Safe Mode and then go to C:\Program Files\BitDefender\BitDefender 2009. Here look for bdsmtpp.dll and bdpop3p.dll. Rename their extension into .d__.


    I did as indicated above, solved my blank subject and from/sender header problem. It removed the anti-spam software. BD official support is thin to non-existent.

  • BD official support is thin to non-existent.


    Well, it was BD official support who supplied the fix...

  • Well, it was BD official support who supplied the fix...


    After 30 days, for something that should not have been part of the product.

  • Did you used in the past BitDefender Internet Security, BitDefender Antvirus plus or BitDefender Total Security? Because that could be a leftover. If you take a look at the manual anti-spam isn't mentioned see here.

  • Earlier in this thread both OP's stated they had installed AV only and had not previously installed any other BD product.


    It was simply a bug in AV.