URGENT MESSAGE RE ROUGE EMAIL

[timetraveller]

URGENT MESSAGE RE ROUGUE EMAIL

PLEASE BE AWARE OF A NEW EMAIL THREAT IF YOU GET AN EMAIL NOTIFICATION SAYING CHECK OUT THIS VIDEO DO NOT OPEN IT

IT CONTAINS A WORM WHICH WILL GRAB YOUR PERSONAL DETAILS INCLUDING CREDIT CARD/BANK CARD DETAILS THEN SET ABOUT DESTROYING YOUR OPERATING SYSTEM DELETE THIS EMAIL YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED

REGARDS PETE

[JohnC]

Thanks for the warning.

[Jeff RV]

Likewise, thanks for the update.

Jeff.

[Doc]

[themos]

Which operating systems are vulnerable to this, anybody know?

[Viking]

Pete,

How did you find this?

Hope your pc is ok.

John

[supernova]

OOPS :offtheair:

[timetraveller]

it was on the BBc news yesterday its aimed at facebook users but it will eat any and all O/S's for breakfast and burp up the lumps i have allready deleted one such email from off my laptop

so please do not ignore the threat is very real

[James]

There's no virus out there that can get any and all OS's. To get every OS there would need to be lots of different virus's which isn't likely given the fundamental differences between Windows and Unix based OS's (Mac OS X/Linux).

James

[timetraveller]

sorry james i was reffering to home pc type o/s including 5 reported cases on linux machines

wasnt including unix or novell software packages

[Ant]

Just make sure that your virus software is up to date!

Ant

[James]

sorry james i was reffering to home pc type o/s including 5 reported cases on linux machines

wasnt including unix or novell software packages

No worries Pete... my home PC runs Mac OS X which is a version of Unix...

Just make sure that your virus software is up to date!

Ant

Agreed!

[timetraveller]

definatley agreed my updates automaticaly every time i go online such lovely people these virus writters not

pete

[themos]

There is a problem with these warnings, most of them are themselves "viruses", rumours spread by people for fun and propagated by well meaning computer users. If you receive a warning, please ignore it unless it contains references to a proper analysis by a technically competent person.

In this case, the warning seems to refer to this item ( from http://www.us-cert.gov/current/archive/2008/12/11/archive.html ) :

Malware Spreading via Social Networking Sites

added December 8, 2008 at 02:48 pm

US-CERT is aware of public reports of malware spreading via popular social networking sites. The reports indicate that this malware is spreading through spam email messages appearing to come from Myspace.com, Facebook.com, and Classmates.com. The email contains a message indicating that there is a YouTube video available and instructs the user to follow the link to view the video. If users click on this link, they will be prompted to update Adobe Flash Player. This update is not a legitimate Adobe Flash Player update--it is malicious code.

US-CERT encourages users and administrators to do the following to help mitigate the risks:

* Install antivirus software and keep the virus signatures up to date.

* Do not follow unsolicited links.

* Use caution when downloading and installing applications.

* Obtain software applications and updates directly from the vendor's website.

* Configure your web browser as described in the Securing Your Web Browser document.

* Refer to the Recognizing and Avoiding Email Scams (pdf) document for more information on avoiding email scams.

* Refer to the Avoiding Social Engineering and Phishing Attacks document for more information on social engineering attacks.

[timetraveller]

hello themos

yes you are correct in your assumption concerning this particular Virus and although i agree there have indeed been several bogus warnings i can assure you in this particular instance the threat is indeed quite real and anybody who does receive such an email would be well advised to take head of the warning i have posted and on the matter of getting qualified opinion can i just point out to you that i am indeed qualified to give such a warning as i spent several years of my life actually working as a fully accredited UNIX novel and MCSE qualified networking engineer designing and installing both pyramid and neural networks for major clients including banks insurance brokers and a large number of NHS health service sites and bogus or not any threat should be taken seriously unless prov-en false even if the only action taken is to ensure all antivirus/ anti spam and firewall software is constantly updated and that users regularly back up their data

[ChrisEdu]

I have a simple rule for emails - if I don't know the sender, or if it looks at all suspicious, it gets deleted straight away without ever being opened.

[timetraveller]

good move Chris that is the only safe way to deal with these things that and updating your protective software on a regular basis burying your head in the sand and treating all warnings as spurious and inaccurate is not in any way a sensible approach and sooner or later your going to get severely bitten. whilst working as a computer engineer a lot of our call out time was spent removing and disinfecting corrupted computer systems. and i have to say that a great number of these systems had some very expensive anti viral and firewall technology built into them but all totally negated by a member of staff bringing in discs from outside sources and the number of businesses who actually had vital data on these machines but failed to make back up copies was frightening. I remember one particular instance of a lady who was doing a degree and who had copied down all her notes ,case studies and subject lectures for the complete three years worth of study without so much as a single hard copy let alone back up file .well to cut a long story short her hard drive basically became corrupted and several hours spent with myself at her address using both Norton Ghost and undelete resulted in regaining just half a dozen files that had been so badly corrupted as to be unusable . This sorry tale happened just 10 weeks before her finals and i would imagine the lesson learned by that lady would last her a life time. and should be a lesson to all basically if you have data on a system which you cannot afford to loose Basically Move it or loose its simple but true

[ChrisEdu]

That sounds so familiar. I remember someone at work bringing their work issued laptop in and having problems with it. Our technician ran a scan and detected somewhere in the region of 234 infections resident on the machine! :shock: