Postfix Built-in Content Inspection

Built-in content inspection introduction

Postfix supports a built-in filter mechanism that examines message header and message body content, one line at a time, before it is stored in the Postfix queue. The filter is usually implemented with POSIX or PCRE regular expressions, as described in the header_checks(5) manual page.

The original purpose of the built-in filter is to stop an outbreak of specific email worms or viruses, and it does this job well. The filter has also helped to block bounced junk email, bounced email from worms or viruses, and notifications from virus detection systems. Information about this secondary application is given in the BACKSCATTER_README document.

Because the built-in filter is optimized for stopping specific worms and virus outbreaks, it has limitations that make it NOT suitable for general junk email and virus detection. For that, you should use one of the external content inspection methods that are described in the FILTER_README, SMTPD_PROXY_README and MILTER_README documents.

The following diagram gives an over-all picture of how Postfix built-in content inspection works:

Postmaster
notifications

| v

Network or
local users -> Built-in
filter -> Postfix
queue -> Delivery
agents -> Network or
local mailbox

^
| | v

Undeliverable mail
Forwarded mail

The picture makes clear that the filter works while Postfix is receiving new mail. This means that Postfix can reject mail from the network without having to return undeliverable mail to the originator address (which is often spoofed anyway). However, this ability comes at a price: if mail inspection takes too much time, then the remote client will time out, and the client may send the same message repeatedly.

Topics covered by this document:

What mail is subjected to header/body checks
Limitations of Postfix header/body checks
Preventing daily mail status reports from being blocked
Configuring header/body checks for mail from outside users only
Configuring header/body checks for mail to some domains only

What mail is subjected to header/body checks

Postfix header/body checks are implemented by the cleanup(8) server before it injects mail into the incoming queue. The diagram below zooms in on the cleanup(8) server, and shows that this server handles mail from many different sources. In order to keep the diagram readable, the sources of postmaster notifications are not shown, because they can be produced by many Postfix daemon processes.

bounce(8)
(undeliverable)

smtpd(8)
(network) \ | v

qmqpd(8)
(network) -\ -/ cleanup(8) -> incoming
queue

pickup(8)
(local) / ^
|

local(8)
(forwarded)

For efficiency reasons, only mail that enters from outside of Postfix is inspected with header/body checks. It would be inefficient to filter already filtered mail again, and it would be undesirable to block postmaster notifications. The table below summarizes what mail is and is not subject to header/body checks.

Message type Source Header/body checks?

Undeliverable mail bounce(8) No

Network mail smtpd(8) Configurable

Network mail qmqpd(8) Configurable

Local submission pickup(8) Configurable

Local forwarding local(8) No

Postmaster notice many No

Message type	Source	Header/body checks?
Undeliverable mail	bounce(8)	No
Network mail	smtpd(8)	Configurable
Network mail	qmqpd(8)	Configurable
Local submission	pickup(8)	Configurable
Local forwarding	local(8)	No
Postmaster notice	many	No

How does Postfix decide what mail needs to be filtered? It would be clumsy to make the decision in the cleanup(8) server, as this program receives mail from so many different sources. Instead, header/body checks are requested by the source. Examples of how to turn off header/body checks for mail received with smtpd(8), qmqpd(8) or pickup(8) are given below under "Configuring header/body checks for mail from outside users only" and "Configuring header/body checks for mail to some domains only".

Limitations of Postfix header/body checks

Header/body checks do not decode message headers or message body content. For example, if text in the message body is BASE64 encoded (RFC 2045) then your regular expressions will have to match the BASE64 encoded form. Likewise, message headers with encoded non-ASCII characters (RFC 2047) need to be matched in their encoded form.
Header/body checks cannot filter on a combination of message headers or body lines. Header/body checks examine content one message header at a time, or one message body line at a time, and cannot carry a decision over to the next message header or body line.
Header/body checks cannot depend on the recipient of a message.
- One message can have multiple recipients, and all recipients of a message receive the same treatment. Workarounds have been proposed that involve selectively deferring some recipients of multi-recipient mail, but that results in poor SMTP performance and does not work for non-SMTP mail.
- Some sources of mail send the headers and content ahead of the recipient information. It would be inefficient to buffer up an entire message before deciding if it needs to be filtered, and it would be clumsy to filter mail and to buffer up all the actions until it is known whether those actions need to be executed.
Despite warnings, some people try to use the built-in filter feature for general junk email and/or virus blocking, using hundreds or even thousands of regular expressions. This can result in catastrophic performance failure. The symptoms are as follows:
- The cleanup(8) processes use up all available CPU time in order to process the regular expressions, and/or they use up all available memory so that the system begins to swap. This slows down all incoming mail deliveries.
- As Postfix needs more and more time to receive an email message, the number of simultaneous SMTP sessions increases to the point that the SMTP server process limit is reached.
- While all SMTP server processes are waiting for the cleanup(8) servers to finish, new SMTP clients have to wait until an SMTP server process becomes available. This causes mail deliveries to time out before they have even begun.
The remedy for this type of performance problem is simple: don't use header/body checks for general junk email and/or virus blocking, and don't filter mail before it is queued. When performance is a concern, use an external content filter that runs after mail is queued, as described in the FILTER_README document.

Preventing daily mail status reports from being blocked

The following is quoted from Jim Seymour's Pflogsumm FAQ at http://jimsun.linxnet.com/downloads/pflogsumm-faq.txt. Pflogsumm is a program that analyzes Postfix logs, including the logging from rejected mail. If these logs contain text that was rejected by Postfix body_checks patterns, then the logging is also likely to be rejected by those same body_checks patterns. This problem does not exist with header_checks patterns, because those are not applied to the text that is part of the mail status report.

You configure Postfix to do body checks, Postfix does its thing, Pflogsumm reports it and Postfix catches the same string in the Pflogsumm report. There are several solutions to this.

Wolfgang Zeikat contributed this:
#!/usr/bin/perl
use MIME::Lite;

### Create a new message:
$msg = MIME::Lite->new(
    From     => 'your@send.er',
    To       => 'your@recipie.nt',
    # Cc     => 'some@other.com, some@more.com',
    Subject  => 'pflogsumm',
    Date     => `date`,
    Type     => 'text/plain',
    Encoding => 'base64',
    Path     => '/tmp/pflogg',
);

$msg->send;
Where "/tmp/pflogg" is the output of Pflogsumm. This puts Pflogsumm's output in a base64 MIME attachment.

Note by Wietse: if you run this on a machine that is accessible by untrusted users, it is safer to store the Pflogsumm report in a directory that is not world writable.

In a follow-up to a thread in the postfix-users mailing list, Ralf Hildebrandt noted:

"mpack does the same thing."

And it does. Which tool one should use is a matter of preference.

Other solutions involve additional body_checks rules that make exceptions for daily mail status reports, but this is not recommended. Such rules slow down all mail and complicate Postfix maintenance.

Configuring header/body checks for mail from outside users only

The following information applies to Postfix 2.1. Earlier Postfix versions do not support the receive_override_options feature.

The easiest approach is to configure ONE Postfix instance with multiple SMTP server IP addresses in master.cf:

Two SMTP server IP addresses for mail from inside users only, with header/body filtering turned off, and a local mail pickup service with header/body filtering turned off.

/etc/postfix.master.cf:
    # ==================================================================
    # service      type  private unpriv  chroot  wakeup  maxproc command
    #                    (yes)   (yes)   (yes)   (never) (100)
    # ==================================================================
    1.2.3.4:smtp   inet  n       -       n       -       -       smtpd
        -o receive_override_options=no_header_body_checks
    127.0.0.1:smtp inet  n       -       n       -       -       smtpd
        -o receive_override_options=no_header_body_checks
    pickup         fifo  n       -       n       60      1       pickup
        -o receive_override_options=no_header_body_checks

One SMTP server address for mail from outside users with header/body filtering turned on via main.cf.

/etc/postfix.master.cf:
    # =================================================================
    # service     type  private unpriv  chroot  wakeup  maxproc command
    #                   (yes)   (yes)   (yes)   (never) (100)
    # =================================================================
    1.2.3.5:smtp  inet  n       -       n       -       -       smtpd

Configuring header/body checks for mail to some domains only

The following information applies to Postfix 2.1. Earlier Postfix versions do not support the receive_override_options feature.

If you are MX service provider and want to apply disable head/body checks for some domains, you can configure ONE Postfix instance with multiple SMTP server IP addresses in master.cf. Each address provides a different service.

/etc/postfix.master.cf:
    # =================================================================
    # service     type  private unpriv  chroot  wakeup  maxproc command
    #                   (yes)   (yes)   (yes)   (never) (100)
    # =================================================================
    # SMTP service for domains with header/body checks turned on.
    1.2.3.4:smtp  inet  n       -       n       -       -       smtpd

    # SMTP service for domains with header/body checks turned off.
    1.2.3.5:smtp  inet  n       -       n       -       -       smtpd
        -o receive_override_options=no_header_body_checks

Once this is set up you can configure MX records in the DNS that route each domain to the proper SMTP server instance.

				Postmaster notifications
				`\| v`
Network or local users	`->`	Built-in filter	`->`	Postfix queue	`->`	Delivery agents	`->`	Network or local mailbox
				^ `\|`		`\| v`
				Undeliverable mail Forwarded mail

		bounce(8) (undeliverable)
smtpd(8) (network)	`\`	`\| v`

qmqpd(8) (network)	`-\ -/`	cleanup(8)	`->`	incoming queue
pickup(8) (local)	`/`	^ `\|`
		local(8) (forwarded)