Norton Internet Security Upgrade Trashes Blacklists

PC Magazine reports: “Norton Internet Security 2008 is good at a lot of things, but blocking spam isn’t one of them. Antispam isn’t even included by default–you have to install a separate add-on pack that hasn’t changed much since NIS 2007. Some users who rely on NIS for spam protection bolster its meager spam-fighting skills by painstakingly building a blacklist of known spammers and a whitelist of valid correspondents. Recently in PC Magazine’s discussion forums, one such user reported shocking news: When you upgrade from NIS 2007 to NIS 2008, your blacklist and whitelist both get erased. Gone. Kaput.”

I’m not a huge fan of spam blacklists. As often as not, the spammers use constantly changing (and false) addresses, so blacklisting a spammer today won’t help tomorrow. But I’d hate to go to all the trouble of accumulating a blacklist and then lose it unexpectedly!

Symantec confirms that at present the upgrade from NIS 2007’s add-on pack to that of NIS 2008 trashes your spam blacklist and whitelist. On the bright side, it’s looking to release a version of the add-on pack that can handle importing those lists. If you’re a current NIS 2007 user who collects spammer addresses, you’ll want to wait for that version before upgrading to NIS 2008.

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