No, your anti-virus program is your first level of defense, so leave the program enabled and running.
Basically a web bug is a graphic on a web page or in an email message that is designed to monitor who is reading the web page or email message. Benign protects you from web bugs within your email. It does not protect you from web bugs when you view web pages via your browser.
Benign expects incoming connections on Port 110, so any firewall software that you are running must be configured to allow incoming connections on that port from the local machine. Connections originating from the intranet/untrusted zone to Port 110 can be blocked without affecting Benign.
Without a firewall, Benign itself only accepts incoming connections from programs on your machine that are configured to use it and blocks any other connections originating from outside your machine. Benign blocks all attempts to connect to your machine from outside, so there is no security risk.
Any incoming connections from outside will be greeted with the following message from Benign:
-ERR Connections are allowed only from the local host (xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx is not a local address).
(Where xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx is the non-authorized IP address being used).
A firewall operating in "Stealth Mode" is required to hide the port completely so that it does not provide any indication that your IP address is valid.
Benign needs to alter the Windows HOSTS file so that the system is able to resolve the "mail server.name.b9" into a specific IP address for "localhost" so Benign can determine which account to scan the mail from.
Without an appropriate entry in the HOSTS file, the computer cannot resolve the "mail server.name.b9" entry and mail can not be retrieved by the mail client.
Are you getting?: Cannot create file C:\...HOSTS
Benign can't work with SSL since SSL is designed to prevent "man in the middle" attacks, which is what Benign does. Benign has been designed to do a few things in relation to this.
When importing an account that is set to use SSL, Benign warns you that you can import this account but if you do, the SSL functionality is disabled. This means you can either continue the import, or cancel it.
SSL can be used/started in two ways, by using another connection to the server on Port 995, or by the client issuing an SSL/STARTTLS command during normal communication with the mail server on Port 110. Benign does not pass on the STARTTLS command.
This all means that Benign won't work on an account that requires SSL, but it does work on an account that currently uses SSL, but doesn't need to.
The only alteration you will get is .b9 is added to the end of your incoming mail POP3 server name within your mail program. Benign automatically adds this suffix .b9 on installation. No action is required on your part.
Let me tell you why:
Suppose you are on a friend's joke email list and you were on a slow dial up connection. You know the story, you wait and wait for his emails to download and meanwhile the phone line is tied up. You do not want to hurt your friend's feelings and ask to be removed from his joke emailing list, so what do you do? You create a new profile to block his executable file attachments (which also can harbor viruses).
You will then be only blocking the file attachments that come from your friend's email address and not all the other email addresses in your address book.
Here is the step by step example and instructions to block your friend's annoying executable attachments:
Step 1. In Benign click Tools > Options > Security profiles > Add > New profile name (enter a name you will know, ie. your friends name) > OK > Apply > OK.
Step 2. In Benign click Tools > Options > Security profiles (pick new profile created in Step 1) then click File extension "bat;com;exe;pif;scr;shs" > Edit > Block > OK > Apply > OK.
Step 3. In Benign click Tools > Options > Domain and address overrides > Add >(enter your friends email address, ie. friend@isp.com > Security Profile (pick the security profile you created in Step 1) > OK > Apply > OK.
Now when friend@isp.com sends you any executable file, ie. wasteofspace.exe, Benign will block the file, but not the email. The email from friend@isp.com will appear in your email program, minus the annoying attachment, called wasteofspace.exe. Your friend will be none the wiser, as he thinks you got the attachment.
If your friend from friend@isp.com asks if you enjoyed the file, wasteofspace.exe, reply "Thanks, it was really good, a real laugh". Test this by checking the Message Log. In Benign click Tools > Summary > Message Log. Click the email from friend@isp.com and the summary will show "Attachments blocked: 1."
In Benign, click Tools > Options > Accounts > then click on the Server name and click Modify, pick Security Profile Low, Medium or High and click OK > Apply.
Compression application created files are not included in the Benign default "Security Profiles", ie. filename.zip. Zip files can contain executable programs that can harbor viruses.
I do suggest adding .zip files to Benign. Firetrust will release an updated Benign that will have .zip file type protection added by default some time in the near future.
You can add these file extensions manually if you wish:
In Benign click Tools > Options > Security Profiles (do for each profile) > Add (the Add button beneath the File Extensions box) and enter File extensions zip Mime type application/x-compressed.
The ‘Block images from external servers’' option will block them. This option is the 'catch all' for external images, and is required to block MSGTAG tags.
In Benign click Tools > Options > Security profiles > Web Bugs and check 'Block Images from external servers' > Apply
Please do this for every Benign Security Profile I.e. Low, Medium and High