Problem : With all email within your Exchange organization going through the Hub
Transport servers, there should be benefits you see and can use. One of
these benefits is the capability to apply rules to messages in transit.
What kind of rules can you apply and how do you use those transport
rules?
Solution : There are no default rules in place to control messaging within your
organization. To establish these rules, you begin by starting the wizard
and working through three main portions of the rule. You have your
conditions to make the rule go into effect, the actions that should be
taken if the condition(s) is met, and any exceptions that might
disqualify a rule from being applied. Creating a rule doesn’t
automatically mean it is enabled. You can disable a rule so that it is
applied when you determine it is time to turn the rule on.
Design a Transport Rule
You might imagine a few
different reasons to create transport rules. For example, let’s say you
have to append a legal disclaimer to all messages that leave your
organization and go to outside persons. You might tell your users to
ensure the message is included at the bottom of their emails, but that
would be putting a great deal of trust on the part of your people with
something that can easily be forgotten. Rather, you can use a transport
rule to ensure it is done automatically.
Another possible rule is
one that prevents individuals from different departments from
communicating with each other in the event they are not legally allowed
to do so. This might seem a bit odd, but in larger companies where legal
obligations are in place, one side of the company cannot discuss things
with another side. Rather than leave it up to employees to follow the
rules on this, you can establish a transport rule to ensure it happens.
You can use transport
rules to filter confidential information, to prevent known virus
extensions from running rampant through your organization, to track or
archive messages that are sent to or received from specific individuals,
to redirect inbound and outbound messages for inspection before
delivery, and much more.
You can create hundreds
of different rules. It’s simply impossible to review all the different
methods of combining conditions, actions, and exceptions. We review the
options for each.
Conditions
From people
From a member of distribution list
From user inside or outside the organization
Sent to people
Sent to a member of distribution list
Sent to user inside or outside organization
Between members of distribution list and distribution list
When any of the recipients in the To field are people
When any of the recipients in the To field is a member of distribution list
When any of the recipients in the Cc field are people
When any of the recipients in the Cc field is a member of distribution list
When any of the recipients in the To or Cc field are people
When any of the recipients in the To or Cc field is a member of distribution list
Marked with classification
When the Subject field contains specific words
When the Subject field or body of the message contains specific words
When a message header contains specific words
When the From address contains specific words
When the Subject field contains text pattern
When the Subject field or the body of the message contains text pattern
When the message header contains text pattern
When the From address contains text pattern
When any attachment file name contains text patterns
When a spam confidence level (SCL) rating is greater than or equal to limit
When the size of any attachment is greater than or equal to limit
Mark with importance
Actions
Log an event with message
Prepped the subject with string
Apply message classification
Append disclaimer text using font, size, color with separator and fallback to action if unable to apply
Set the spam confidence level to value
Set header with value
Remove header
Add a recipient in the To field addresses
Copy the message to addresses
Blind carbon copy (Bcc) the message to addresses
Redirect the message to addresses
Send bounce message to sender with enhanced status code
Silently drop the message
Exceptions
Except when the message is from people
Except when the message is from members of distribution list
Except when the message is from users inside or outside the organization
Except when the message is sent to people
Except when the message is sent to a member of distribution list
Except when the message is sent to users inside or outside the organization
Except when the message is sent between members of distribution list and distribution list
Except when any of the recipients in the To field are people
Except when any of the recipients in the To field is a member of distribution list
Except when any of the recipients in the Cc field are people
Except when any of the recipients in the Cc field is a member of distribution list
Except when any of the recipients in the To field or Cc field are people
Except when any of the recipients in the To field or Cc field is a member of distribution list
Except when the message is marked as classification
Except when the text specific words appear in the subject
Except when the text specific words appear in the subject or body of the message
Except when the text specific words appear in a message header
Except when the From address contains specific words
Except when the text pattern appears in the subject
Except when the text pattern appears in the subject or body of the message
Except when the text pattern appears in the header
Except when the From address contains text patterns
Except when the text pattern appears in any attachment file name
Except when the spam confidence level (SCL) is greater than or equal to limit
Except when the size of any attachment is greater than or equal to limit
Create a Transport Rule
On
a Hub Transport server, there is a Transport Rules agent, whereas on an
Edge Transport server, there is an Edge Rules agent. They are similar
in concept but different in usage. If you use an Edge Transport server,
you want to ensure rules you might apply on your Hub Transport servers
ordinarily are also included on the Edge Transport for further
protection. For example, in the event a virus is detected and you know
the extension you are looking to drop, you would place the rule on both
the Hub and Edge Transport servers to ensure it is dropped internally
and from external messages as well. Prior to the update of your
antivirus software, you might create a quick transport rule that drops
messages with that extension, but you need to create the rule on both
the Hub and Edge transport sides.
Rules created for
the Hub Transport servers are established at the organizational level
and will apply throughout your organization. Those created on an Edge
Transport server apply only on that server. The rules are not shared and
so must be individually established on each Edge Transport server.
Note
The instructions
to follow and corresponding screenshots are from an Edge Transport
server. The only distinction you would make on the Hub Transport side is
that you would select the Organization Configuration work center and
click Hub Transport and then the Transport Rules tab. On the Edge
Transport server, you have less in the Navigation pane to be concerned
with but the wizard is the same. You might notice that the Edge
Transport server doesn’t allow for as many options to configure, and
that is because it has a limited scope of application, whereas the Hub
Transport server offers all the options previously mentioned.
To create a transport rule on the Edge Transport server, perform the following:
1. | Open the EMC.
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2. | From the Navigation Tree, select Edge Transport.
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3. | Select the Transport Rules tab, and from the Actions pane, select the New Transport Rule link to open the wizard.
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4. | On
the Introduction screen, you are asked for a name for the rule and a
comment where you can explain the purpose of the rule you are creating.
You can also select/deselect a checkbox for the rule to be automatically
enabled or disabled after it is created. Enter the information and
click Next.
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5. | The Conditions screen, shown in Figure 1,
enables you to choose one or more conditions you want met before action
is taken on a message. In Step 1, you select the condition, and in Step
2, you alter the condition by selecting an underlined value and
indicating your personal need. If you want to have emails from a group
moved into a certain folder, you can select the option in the first part
and indicate the exact group in the second. After you have your
condition(s) established, click Next.
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6. | The
Actions screen enables you to select an action or actions to perform in
the event the condition is met. After the action(s) is determined,
click Next.
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7. | The
Exceptions screen is not mandatory. Here you can select a variety of
exceptions to this transport rule if you need them. Configure your
exceptions and choose Next.
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8. | After
the three aspects of the rule are in place, the Create Rule screen
allows you to review the Configuration Summary for the rule. If
something is amiss, click Back. If everything is fine, click New.
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9. | After the rule has been created, click Finish.
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After the rule is in
place, you can select the rule at any time and from the Actions pane
choose to disable the rule, remove the rule, or edit the rule.
