Bug 552127 - SpamAssassin new year 2010 issue with FH_DATE_PAST_20XX 0.0
Summary: SpamAssassin new year 2010 issue with FH_DATE_PAST_20XX 0.0
Keywords:
Status: CLOSED ERRATA
Alias: None
Product: Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5
Classification: Red Hat
Component: spamassassin
Version: 5.4
Hardware: All
OS: Linux
high
high
Target Milestone: rc
: ---
Assignee: Petr Lautrbach
QA Contact: qe-baseos-daemons
URL:
Whiteboard:
Depends On:
Blocks:
TreeView+ depends on / blocked
 
Reported: 2010-01-04 06:12 UTC by ritz
Modified: 2018-10-27 15:46 UTC (History)
8 users (show)

Fixed In Version: spamassassin-3.3.1-1.el5
Doc Type: Bug Fix
Doc Text:
Due to an incorrect "FH_DATE_PAST_20XX" filter rule, many emails containing the date 2010 in the message header were wrongly regarded as spam. According to the rule, all email messages containing the date between 2010 and 2099 had the spam score increased. To fix this problem, the rule "FH_DATE_PAST_20XX" has been modified to reflect the current year.
Clone Of:
Environment:
Last Closed: 2011-07-21 09:01:28 UTC
Target Upstream Version:
Embargoed:


Attachments (Terms of Use)


Links
System ID Private Priority Status Summary Last Updated
Red Hat Product Errata RHBA-2011:1035 0 normal SHIPPED_LIVE spamassassin bug fix and enhancement update 2011-07-20 15:43:59 UTC

Description ritz 2010-01-04 06:12:31 UTC
Description of problem:
SpamAssassin includes a rule known as FH_DATE_PAST_20XX, which adds 2-3 points to any message with a 2010 date in the headers, and as a result is generating more false positives than usual.


Additional info:
http://lwn.net/Articles/368396/

Temporary workaround , is to add the below to local.cf file.

    score FH_DATE_PAST_20XX 0.0

Upstream fix 
http://svn.apache.org/viewvc/spamassassin/trunk/rulesrc/sandbox/emailed/00_FVGT_File001.cf?r1=794319&r2=796216&diff_format=h

Comment 2 Warren Togami 2010-01-04 08:33:29 UTC
This does not require a package update.  You should be using sa-update on a nightly basis to update to the latest rules.  The updated rules solve this particular problem.

Uncomment the line in /etc/cron.d/sa-update then restart crond to enable the nightly sa-update.

Comment 8 William Yardley 2010-12-18 01:07:37 UTC
This is an insane response, and I can't believe that RHEL5.5 still ships with a version of SpamAssassin that has this bug.

The default package should not continue to ship with rules that are this badly broken.

sa-update doesn't run by default, and in any event, wouldn't run until the evening after the system was built. There is no notification that I know of that would let a user know that they *need* to enable this cron job, even if they wished to. Also, running sa-update, even as the comments in the cron job says, is not appropriate for every environment.

Comment 9 Warren Togami 2010-12-26 07:30:08 UTC
Back when this bug was closed, Red Hat had given approval to upgrade RHEL-5.x to spamassassin-3.3.x which would have solved this and other problems.  It seems that internal processes have failed to approve that upgrade, thus this remains broken.

Comment 10 RHEL Program Management 2010-12-26 07:47:32 UTC
This request was evaluated by Red Hat Product Management for
inclusion in the current release of Red Hat Enterprise Linux.
Because the affected component is not scheduled to be updated in the
current release, Red Hat is unfortunately unable to address this
request at this time. Red Hat invites you to ask your support
representative to propose this request, if appropriate and relevant,
in the next release of Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

Comment 11 Warren Togami 2011-01-04 10:06:55 UTC
Hi William,

http://www.spamtips.org/p/rpm-packages.html
I highly recommend using my EL-5 spamassassin package here.  Please follow the directions.  I have been using a package in production very close to this since March 2010, and this very package since October 2010.  Report bugs in that package to me.  You may also be interested in other configuration tips written in that blog.

https://admin.fedoraproject.org/mailman/listinfo/spamassassin-news
Also consider subscribing to my newsletter targeted at Spamassassin Sysadmins.

Warren

Comment 15 Petr Lautrbach 2011-05-27 08:56:58 UTC
    Technical note added. If any revisions are required, please edit the "Technical Notes" field
    accordingly. All revisions will be proofread by the Engineering Content Services team.
    
    New Contents:
Running sa-update in daily basis is now mandatory. Uncomment the line in /etc/cron.d/sa-update to enable the nightly  rules update.

Comment 17 Miroslav Svoboda 2011-06-20 09:42:00 UTC
    Technical note updated. If any revisions are required, please edit the "Technical Notes" field
    accordingly. All revisions will be proofread by the Engineering Content Services team.
    
    Diffed Contents:
@@ -1 +1 @@
-Running sa-update in daily basis is now mandatory. Uncomment the line in /etc/cron.d/sa-update to enable the nightly  rules update.+Due to an incorrect "FH_DATE_PAST_20XX" filter rule, many emails containing the date 2010 in the message header were wrongly regarded as spam. According to the rule, all email messages containing the date between 2010 and 2099 had the spam score increased. To fix this problem, the rule "FH_DATE_PAST_20XX" has been modified to reflect the current year.

Comment 18 errata-xmlrpc 2011-07-21 09:01:28 UTC
An advisory has been issued which should help the problem
described in this bug report. This report is therefore being
closed with a resolution of ERRATA. For more information
on therefore solution and/or where to find the updated files,
please follow the link below. You may reopen this bug report
if the solution does not work for you.

http://rhn.redhat.com/errata/RHBA-2011-1035.html


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