Re: Hi

> Time for my irregular recommendation for Mozilla as an email client.
I'm
> using the combined package, others swear by Firebird and Thunderbird
as
> standalone apps. Much more secure, there hasn't been a "let someone
else
> control your computer" bug in Mozilla.

Not entirely true... 
Mozilla isn't affected by the macro viruses, however most email based
viruses 
work of the simple concept of I/O errors.
That is, Idiot Operator errors.  People going and opening anything they
get in 
email attachments, even though randomly named, and containing dodgy file

extensions like .exe and .vbs
This affects everyone, regardless of email client.  Just its lucky that
99% of 
viruses are windows based, the other 1% never seem to get anywhere.

The way to avoid this is to use Mac, Linux, BSD, etc.

This virus, "beagle" is an .exe file, so only hits windows computers,
and it 
doesn't matter what email client you use, the program scans for email 
addresses in other places, like webpages and your addressbooks (.wab,
.mab?), 
and a few other things.  It then forges email headers and sends itself
on.

You can check out the norton site: 
http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/w32.beagle.a@mm.
html

This explains it more. I recommend if u ran that program from laserlight
that 
you read this page, as the virus is not very pleasant and you need to
get rid 
of it quickly.

So yeah, if you want to avoid this, the simplest way is:
1) Get a virus scanner, and keep it updated! Set the automatic updates
to 
daily even.
2) Don't open anything you are unsure about.  And especially avoid
things with 
".exe" and ".vbs" extensions.  You might commonly see "somename.jpg.vbs"
 
this is a way a tricking most users into opening the virus script, which
most  
run on any win2k and xp machine, regardless of mail client.
If you get such an email, confirm with the sender before opening the 
attachment.

So, ultimately the best defense is vigilance. Look out for this type of
thing.	
Its only going to get worse as we get more and more bored geeks coming
out of 
high schools around the world.

Cheers,
Andrew Ayres

>
> Steve Gill wrote:
> >Agreed, but with any luck the source can be traced by the list
> >administrators.
> >
> >
> >---
> >Steve Gill
> >
> >Steve@caws.demon.co.uk
> >http://homepage.ntlworld.com/caws.uk/hotelwars/hotel_wars.htm
> >
> >This message has been checked for all known viruses by Norton
Internet
> >Security.
> >
> >>-----Original Message-----
> >>From: owner-gzg-l@lists.CSUA.Berkeley.EDU [mailto:owner-gzg-
> >>l@lists.CSUA.Berkeley.EDU] On Behalf Of Roger Burton West
> >>Sent: 19 January 2004 15:37
> >>To: gzg-l@csua.berkeley.edu
> >>Subject: Re: Hi
> >>
> >>On Mon, Jan 19, 2004 at 03:31:51PM -0000, Steve Gill wrote:
> >>>This showed up with a virus attached:
> >>
> >>I'm afraid that all this means is that the person with the infected
> >>computer has at some point received mail from the GZG list.
> >>
> >>Roger (who doesn't let Windows anywhere near his email)