Q: Sophos - Installation Instructions for Linux

Starting July of 2021, IS&T has migrated to a new version of Sophos called Sophos Central. MIT users have until the summer of 2022 before the old version will stop receiving updates. This page references the legacy version of Sophos. You can see documentation for the new Sophos Central here and download the newest version of Sophos here.

Answer

1. Download MIT's Sophos Anti-Virus package from the IS&T download website (certificates required).
2. Expand the archive "mit-sophos-linux-9.12.2_VE3.65.2.zip".
3. Open a command prompt and navigate into the directory "savlinux" (e.g. cd ~/Desktop/savlinux).
4. Execute the script install.sh (sudo bash install.sh, YOU MUST BE ROOT).
5. Follow the on-screen instructions to complete the Sophos Anti-Virus installation.
   1. The default installation options can be accepted by hitting the Enter key when prompted.
   2. Select Y for all options and leave the default path.
   3. It will take a bit of time after install before Sophos properly talks to the servers and updates. Once that happens it will be configured properly.
6. Command line options and controls are available to update, scan, and manage Sophos. For more information, please see the Sophos user guide (PDF). If you left the default path during the install you will generally find everything in /opt/sophos-av.

Sophos On-access scanning may not be available for all Linux distributions and kernel versions.You can see which versions are supported in the extracted savlinux folder in the file supported_kernels.txt.

If you have Debathena installed or wish to install Debathena, please see [How do I install Debathena on top of an existing Ubuntu or Debian distribution running Sophos Anti-Virus?]

See Also

• Sophos Landing Page