Hoax, chain letters and viruses |
Since several months we receive a series of mails from you which are in fact forwards of mails you received. While we always appreciate to hear from you, we also want to inform you on a phenomenon of modern society that can cause damage to you and your installations.
To tell you the little story first:
We received a specific warning from one of our friends, a
knowledgeable computer guy. He informed us that he personally had sent
us a virus, and he gave the description. The file mentioned was only on
the one of our computers where we received his mail. He recommended to
delete it.
His warning was a hoax, circulating in his specific community. He had translated it into French. We would have deleted a system file on our computer. His recall of its first message came several hours later. No damage happened, but we have never been that close. |
We give you here a little collection of advise and explanation. We are living in a world where terrorist attacks come daily to our computer installations. Fight them!
Q: | Why fight hoaxes and chain letters? | ||||||||||||||||||
A: | Please find the following notice from the http://intranet.chrysler.com/admin/cmipsite/hoax_chain_letters.shtml site: | ||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||
Q: | What should you do if you receive a chain letter in your E-Mail? | ||||||||||||||||||
A: | Delete it! Don't forward the message!! If you want to confirm that the message is indeed a hoax, check it out: There is a description of all viruses and hoax virus warnings in the Symantec Antivirus Center. There are several websites for hoax warnings. | ||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||
Q: | Now, i will not sent virus warnings any more, and never ask again to delete a file on my system. But how about that nice PowerPoint presentation that matches the Sunday sermon in church? The poem i got from a good friend? The funny picture i got yesterday? The joke i thought so funny? The little swinging comic or dancing christmas tree? | ||||||||||||||||||
A: |
There is no one-fits-all answer. But beware: Viruses travel by mail, but for now they mostly do this via attachments. So while you are watching that little show with the cute girl dancing on your screen, your files might be wiped in the background. But of course not every animated picture is a virus - most of them aren't! |
Q: |
How to be safe(r) against viruses? |
|
A: |
First, you need a good antivirus software. Second, you need to update the virus definitions. These updates can be downloaded from the net. You need to do this about once a week. (Yes: once a week. The updates are needed to fight against the actual viruses circulating. You hardly need to fight against a virus that run havoc on your PC when Bill Gates was still in highschool.) Third, sorry Bill, today's trend is to use macro viruses. Most of the time, they attack Outlook, the mail system, and have it do weird things. Outlook is a good software. I do not use it because of this. Why buy a sleek car if every thief learns how to steal it? |
|
See which Viruses are around today. Are you protected?
Interactive Map showing the actual Virus threats:
|
This is my policy:
|