New e-mail policy at work. Am i reasonable?

[Transition]

So i got a complaint today that our e-mail was slow. Turns out a user was trying to receive a 21meg video (non-work related). We've got way too many people sending large video attachements with a network backbone that just can't support the abuse.

A 1.2 meg down and a 768k up DSL line doesn't work well when you have 75 people in an office abusing the system all day long (the connection available is out of my control unfortunately). So, i figured we've gave all the users multiple notices that they cannot be sending LARGE non-work related attachments so this is my recourse.

The new policy is everyone has a 20 megabyte mailbox and the max single inbound and outbound message size is 5 megs. Our line of work does not require users handle large files (video's or otherwise). I'm telling people i can accomodate different policies on a per-instance basis. All people need to do is call me and tell me why they need a large inbox or whatever.

Do you think this policy is fair?

 

[madthumbs]

You have to worry more about what your boss thinks. If you're the boss, yes it's fair. Of course you want to balance employee happiness with productivity. What happened to Warning -> Probation -> Can?

 

[ktwebb]

I don't see where the inbox is relevant to transfers. That's only applicable to space on the server however IMO, 5 MB email data tranfsers is too large for a pipe as small as the one your using AND that many users. Frankly that is too many people on a 1.2/768K IMO anyway but if that is what you got then I would adjust accordingly. 1 MB transfers only. Anything over would have to be ok'd and justified. You could also encourage users to send stuff after hours.

I'd say what your giving them is not only fair to them, it's too generous.

 

[TOPACTION]

like kt said well here for around 800 user we got a 4.5 outboud limit and around 300MB for the inbox... Yes I think only 20 MB for the inbox its a little cheap (well depend of your exchange HD) but 5 MB or less for outbound is a MUST... we rarely see some word or excel file that go over 5 MB... if yes well almost all user have winzip or a zip tool with win xp... its free so lets use it and save BW...

 

[JeffMD]

If your mail software dosnt support it, you can use one of many programs like netlimiter to LIMIT the speed of your mail server's uplink. at 256kbit the persons 21 meg email could have been finished in 10 minutes, for 75 users that wouldnt create much of a backlog im sure. and you would have had plenty of upload left for other stuff.

That downlink how ever, is that 1.2 megabit or byte? if its bit, I would think about looking into a web proxy server that supports image recompression.

 

[Transition]

Re-thinking the 20 megabyte limit - i'll bump it up to 100 megs. A majority of people here do not leave copies of their messages on the server. We're using a server called iMail by ipSwitch. Yes, it sucks.

Not sure if the DSL line is bits or bytes...

And yes, it would be nice to have a proxy setup that handles image recompression. I've got a Slackware box that i'd lke to use for something like that.

Thanks for your input everyone

 

[vi edit]

I'd start with just restricting .mov, .wma, .mpg, .mpeg, .mp3, and .wav files on inbound and outbound emails. Obviously someone could zip that file up and it wouldn't be caught, but that will knock down a lot of the traffic.

Then combine it with attachment size restrictions.

 

[Transition]

Originally posted by: vi_edit
I'd start with just restricting .mov, .wma, .mpg, .mpeg, .mp3, and .wav files on inbound and outbound emails. Obviously someone could zip that file up and it wouldn't be caught, but that will knock down a lot of the traffic.

Then combine it with attachment size restrictions.

Yea i was thinking about doing that. But thought it may be a bit over-zealous. I want a reasonable policy, that doesn't create 150 enemies at the same time. I know there will always be abuse to some level, and i want to take baby-steps before i start restricting all files of a certain type.

Thanks for the suggestion though vi. Let me know if you're in the Minneapolis area again sometime - beer on me. :beer:

 

[vi edit]

Originally posted by: Transition

Originally posted by: vi_edit
I'd start with just restricting .mov, .wma, .mpg, .mpeg, .mp3, and .wav files on inbound and outbound emails. Obviously someone could zip that file up and it wouldn't be caught, but that will knock down a lot of the traffic.

Then combine it with attachment size restrictions.

Yea i was thinking about doing that. But thought it may be a bit over-zealous. I want a reasonable policy, that doesn't create 150 enemies at the same time. I know there will always be abuse to some level, and i want to take baby-steps before i start restricting all files of a certain type.

Thanks for the suggestion though vi. Let me know if you're in the Minneapolis area again sometime - beer on me. :beer:

It might sound like a BOFH'ish tactic, but the bottom line is - the company pays the bills on the lines, pays to store the emails, pays the employee to do work and if your company is losing productivity because of personal use then it IS the companies responsibility to stop it.

If people want to pass around movies and whatnot, they can do it at home on their own personal email accounts. You aren't there to be everone's friend unfortunately. Most users simply don't understand how quickly those attachments add up and how much they can choke your pipe to the internet.

And I think I actually owe you the beer. I think I short changed the bill when I was up there last time.

 

[err]

I'd probably also consider an smtp relay box that has the capabilities of delaying large email download until after workhours.

transfering 21 mb video is ridiculous.

My email policy restrict anything larger than 7 mb. It will bounce.

I would also restrict all multimedia file format since those are usually the killer. If people need those multimedia format, try to force them to use FTP instead of killing the email server.

You can then throttle your FTP server easily to suck in file at slower rate.

 

[EULA]

my email policy restricts anything over 1.5 megs... there are better methods for transferring or distributing anything larger...

 

[Woodie]

Drop those attachments! We do...and it does create some calls. Still, it takes a fair amount of something to go to the head of security and ask for an exception because "I want to see this really neat video" and provide a business case for it.

Also, 5MB is quite generous for file attachments. As mentioned above, the users can use .zip or multiple emails to get the files out there. For that matter, many of the receiving email servers will have similar size limitations anyway.

We strip .exe's, .pif's, .com's, .vbs, and the list goes on. Anything that can be "executed" directly from an email gets stripped. About the only exceptions are .zips, and MS Office documents (.doc, .xls, .ppt).

This is one more way to prevent virus and worm infections.

 

[networkman]

Originally posted by: Woodie
Drop those attachments! We do...and it does create some calls. Still, it takes a fair amount of something to go to the head of security and ask for an exception because "I want to see this really neat video" and provide a business case for it.

Also, 5MB is quite generous for file attachments. As mentioned above, the users can use .zip or multiple emails to get the files out there. For that matter, many of the receiving email servers will have similar size limitations anyway.

We strip .exe's, .pif's, .com's, .vbs, and the list goes on. Anything that can be "executed" directly from an email gets stripped. About the only exceptions are .zips, and MS Office documents (.doc, .xls, .ppt).

This is one more way to prevent virus and worm infections.

Good man! We've got a very similar arrangement at my work too.

 

[Kelemvor]

We have a limit of 5 megs on attachments as well. There's nothing unreasonable about that at all. We ave on Exchange 2000 and every user get 50 megs of space and 5 meg attachment limits. Used to be 20 and 3 back with Exchange 5.5 but they upped it when we went to e2k.

Also because of all the viruses going around, specific file extensions are automatically blocked and this includes ZIp, PIF, etc. So when sending something that's a zip we have to change it to a TXT file and then rename it. But at least it keeps most viruses out.

 

[dphantom]

Had a user wanting to send a 30MB attachment to many home users and wondered why she couldn't. :roll:

We limit to 8MB attachments, still too big IMHO.