Archivematica 1.17.0 is our latest release.

Scan for viruses

The scan for viruses microservice runs at multiple points in the transfer and ingest workflows inside Archivematica. Archivematica uses the ClamAV antivirus engine and its configuration is discussed here. The configuration of this service can effect whether PREMIS events are recorded for files or not.

The event log for a successful virus check

The event log for a successful virus check

We look at the impact of various settings below.

Exploring ClamAV settings

MaxFileSize If a file is passed to the scanner that is larger than this then it will not be scanned. No event will be recorded.

MaxScanSize limits the number of bytes that will be scanned. This might be used in a standard operating environment where one might be confident a virus or malware will only appear within that range. In Archivematica, because of the possibility of a virus still existing outside of that range, a PREMIS event cannot be recorded confidently.

MaxStreamLength is a setting used in Clamdscan only. The maximum number of bytes that can be sent to the ClamAV daemon. Files that are larger than this limit cannot be sent in their entirety to the server and so a PREMIS event that states the existence or non-existence of malware in the file cannot be recorded confidently.

We can observe the impact of different combinations of configuration options in the following two tables.

Clamscan

FileSize MaxFileSize MaxScanSize Scanned? Premis Event
42M 42M 42M Yes Yes
42M 42M 42M No No
84M 84M 42M No No
84M 42M 84M No No

Clamdscan

FileSize MaxFileSize MaxScanSize StreamMaxLength Scanned? Premis Event
42M 42M 42M 100M Yes Yes
42M 42M 42M 21M No No
84M 84M 42M 100M No No
84M 42M 84M 100M No No

In both tables you can see that if for any reason a file is not scanned, or ‘not-completely-scanned’, a PREMIS event will not be recorded. A PREMIS event in either instance of PASS or FAIL would be a false-positive.

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Archivematica 1.17.0

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