Firewall not blocking EICAR test virus

[Guest]

[Syntax42]

Using HTTP to visit the test virus page on EICAR.org worked fine.  However, the firewall failed to block the test virus when I attached it to an outgoing email and when I used a chat program to pass the test virus to another user.  Neither should have been encrypted, so I don't understand why the firewall isn't inspecting packets for viruses.  Is that beyond the average ability of firewalls?  Is it something that can be fixed with proper configuration?

[mrkroket]

What kind of chat? Maybe the chat is encrypted so it's invisible to firewall.
About the mail, i never used but in POP there is a virus scanner option.
Are you sure it is enabled?

On SMTP maybe it doens't have the option.

[Syntax42]

The program used is Spark which connects to an OpenFire server inside my network.  I was testing in a manner which passed the traffic through the firewall.  Spark uses XMPP and is not encrypted for file transfers.  I don't know if XMPP is used for the actual transfer.  My guess is FTP is the protocol it uses.