Re:<nettime> VIRUS ALERT (fwd)

[Paul Bissex <pb {AT} well.com>]

I can never tell if people post panicky virus warnings to Nettime as some
sort of wry meta-commentary, but... for those who do this sort of thing in
earnest I highly recommend checking the CIAC site at
<http://ciac.llnl.gov/cgi-bin/index/bulletins> before forwarding such
messages.

>From <http://ciac.llnl.gov/ciac/bulletins/h-47a.shtml>:

>========
>
>The original AOL4FREE Macintosh program was developed to fraudulently
>create free
>AOL accounts. The creator of that program has pleaded guilty to defrauding
>America Online for distributing that program. Anyone else attempting to use
>that program to defraud AOL could also be prosecuted.
>
>The AOL4FREE Virus Warning message has been circulating about the Internet
>and warns of an AOL4FREE virus infected e-mail message that infects and
>destroys a system when the message is read, but that warning is a hoax
>and not about this Trojan horse.
>
>1.  The AOL4FREE.COM program is a Trojan Horse, not a virus. It does not
>    spread on its own.
>2.  A Trojan Horse must be run to do any damage.
>3.  Reading an e-mail message with the Trojan Horse program as an attachment
>    will not run the Trojan Horse and will not do any damage. Note that
>    opening an attached program from within an e-mail reader runs that
>    attached program, which may make it appear that reading the attachment
>    caused the damage. Users should keep in mind that any file with a .COM or
>    .EXE extension is a program, not a document and that double clicking or
>    opening that program will run it. Macintosh users have the additional
>    problem that Macintosh programs do not have readable extensions, and so
>    are more difficult to detect. Extra care should be taken to insure
>    that you do not unintentionally execute an attached program.
>
>CIAC still affirms that reading an e-mail message, even one with an attached
>program, can not do damage to a system. The attachment must be both downloaded
>onto the system and run to do any damage.

There's a search form at <http://ciac.llnl.gov/cgi-bin/index/bulletins>.


Paul Bissex, Technology Writer * <http://www.well.com/~pb/tech/>
Office: 413.585.9442 * 160 Main St. Suite 23 Northampton MA 01060 USA
PGP key: <http://www.well.com/user/pb/pgpkey.asc>
PGP fingerprint: DC C3 15 26 7C 79 39 B9  8C 6A BE 12 9C 76 D2 33 


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