URGENT: Microsoft Critical Update emails - viruses / worms !!

Sim

Administrator
Hi all,

Despite my regular warnings about viruses and such, I am saddened to find that I have begun receiving literally dozens of emails a day from forum members which have the W32.Swen.A@mm virus / worm.

Please make sure you have up to date virus definitions - and please PLEASE never execute anything that is sent to you unsolicited, even from a major corporation such as Microsoft.

Microsoft NEVER sends out emails to people asking them to update their systems. They will only ever redirect you to somewhere on their website and ask you to download something, and I have never seen Microsoft send out such an email - except perhaps to corporate accounts, never to end users.

As a general rule, you should NEVER run an executable (.exe) file sent to you by email - even if sent by a friend - as most of the viruses and worms out there these days can spoof email addresses making the appear to come from someone other than who it does come from. I would suggest that if possible, you block any .exe files from coming into your system completely - there is almost never a reason to receive these files by email.

And I would also go as far as to suggest that you should also never send an executable (.exe) file to someone by email - especially because most sensible peope would delete them without even looking at them.

Please take action on this matter - caution is required and you need to pay attention to the warnings. Don't think you are not affected by these things. Don't think that you are immune.
 
Sim

Does it still work to have a false email address set up in the outlook address book, or whichever email system you use, with the outgoing email address just being 00 (zero zero)

This was advised years ago, as any bulk emailings from your address book would then stop at the 00 address, as it was not a valid email, and no further addresses would be actioned. The advantage of using 00 as the name aswell as the email address was that it came first in the list, so it stopped all emails from being actioned.

I also set one up as ZZ, just in case the address book was actioned in reverse order.

I am not sure if the spammers have got around that or not.

regards
ABC
 
Basically, no.

Read about it here: http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/trick.address.book.entry.html

Although this is technically not a hoax--in theory, it could work with a few older worms and viruses--Symantec Security Response STRONGLY recommends that you ignore it. You should not rely on such "fixes" to prevent the spread of viruses, worms, and Trojans. Also, a hacker could exploit some variants of this message to make you more susceptible to loss of confidential information.
 
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