June 4, 2001
I received an email telling me of a virus warning. I bet you get tons of those too. I get email telling me of virus hoaxes. I bet you get tons of those too. I get tons of email from people, places, or things that I just don’t read. I bet that is where many of you fail to draw the line. I don’t even read many of the virus warnings or hoax messages being that most of them are false or are viruses themselves. I bet many of you open these messages blindly. I bet you even open messages that are addressed to other people that show up in your inbox. Face it people. Those of you opening any and all email should not even be allowed access to a computer. Writers of computer viruses, and virus hoaxes, are preying off you idiots. They play off the inexperienced computer user. They play with you. Only the clever and well-written viruses should be threats, not basic, let’s take advantage of idiots types. How about a quick lesson in virus and virus hoax safety?
These two are obvious. You DO NOT KNOW the sender. Major red flag.
A message with an attachment from someone you do not know. DON’T OPEN IT. This is the easiest way to get sick.
A message without an attachment from someone you do not know. Again, you are at risk. Most of the time it is Spam, but I do not bother opening things that arrive from an unknown. I treat it like junk mail that arrives like snail mail. Trash.
Let’s try something more devious.
A message from someone you know. No attachment. Pretty safe bet that no virus is involved.
A message from someone you know with a subject with “FWD:” in it? Hmmmm? Pretty safe, but I sure would think about not opening it.
Ten messages from someone you know with the same subject line? I would not touch that at all! Many viruses will send themselves out many times. This is a good sign of trouble.
A message from someone you know with an attachment. I would be wary. Unless it is a normal practice or business, I would think about the attachment and run a virus scan of it. Better safe than sorry.
A message from someone you know with an attachment and a subject line “FWD:” in it. I would definitely avoid this. Scan first. Scan it twice. Then maybe I will open it.
This list will go on. It is common sense to have a good virus scan software running. Any time you receive multiple messages from the same sender it is a good bet that there is something fishy attached to it. Yet, many viruses do not arrive as attachments. Some are those dreaded vbs, or Visual Basic Scripts. If you do not have scanning software, disable visual basic scripts from running or opening. Disable your Preview screen! Those VBS’s love to play off that since opening the email activates them. Your Preview screen is automatically opening your email. That is why you get screwed.
When the hoax is the virus. We have all seen the email telling us to delete some file from our computer. If you receive a message informing you to delete a file from anyone and you do it, then you must be the ultimate idiot. People have followed the instructions to delete files from their computer. It is a sad world. Ever thought that those files are necessary to run your system? Ever thought maybe someone decided to create the ultimate, no source code virus? The hoax is now the virus.
A little common sense will take you far to avoid computer viruses. I was infected once. I think we all get infected at least once. Mine was a worm. It was a sneaky thing that was not detected by my original virus checker. I upgraded soon after that. Common sense dictates that you get a good virus checker program. It also dictates whether you open that email from the unknown sender. Think about what you are receiving and whether you will open that next email.
BE
Books |
Some Lite Reading
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| E-mail Virus Protection Handbook :... by James Stanger |
Virus Proof, 2nd Edition |
The Raptor Virus : A Novel by Frank Simon |
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