VIRUS ALERT!-ESCAPEES EMAIL

[Karl]

Today I have received 5 emails purportedly from Escapees.com email which have the WORM_MYTOB.DZ virus attached. These emails come with subjects "Your Account is Suspended", "You have successfully updated your password", "*DETECTED* Online User Violation", "IMPORTANT NOTIFICATION", "YOUR ACCOUNT IS SUSPENDED FOR SECURITY REASONS", from [email protected], or [email protected],or [email protected],or [email protected]. This worm is rated by Trend Micro as Damage potential-HIGH, Distribution level-HIGH and occurance level-LOW. It can take complete control over your computer. DO NOT open these emails or their attachments!!!!

 

[Jim Dick]

Karl,

Thanks for the heads up. I am using Escapees mail and, so far, have not seen any problems. I hope they control it soon.

 

[Ron]

We use Escapees mail too but haven't had any problem.  Thanks for the heads up Karl.
Did you send Escapees a heads up?

 

[Bob Maxwell]

Ron,

No use writing Escapees as it didn't come from them --it came from someone else's cpmputer that has the escapees email addresses in their address book and they got infected. 

 

[Ron]

Ron,

No use writing Escapees as it didn't come from them --it came from someone else's cpmputer that has the escapees email addresses in their address book and they got infected.?

True, but letting them know its happening maybe they will want to  issue a warning to Escapees Mail users.

 

[Karl]

Bob,

I Understand there's usually no good way to track the orginal sender, but it still says it's probable or possible that someone has hijacked the Escapees member list. My only hope is that people become aware that opening any email attachments from unknown sources not be done, and that they keep their virus protection up to date. Had mine not been, I would have possibly infected others; both on the Forum and others. That is not acceptable to me.

Finally, no one is safe from viruses. If you don't have an anti-virus program, get one - and a firewall. If you do have them, remember that they are not an "Install and Forget" type of program; they MUST be updated regularily. Personally, I've used the PC-cillin from Trend Micro at http://www.trendmicro.com/en/home/us/enterprise.htm], and have never been a victim.? There are others availlable; the choice is yours.

 

[Jim Dick]

Karl,

You are correct about keepiing the anti virus up to date. I use AVG and it automatically checks for updates each time I go on line. Not full proof but it sure is much better than none at all.

 

[Ned]

Jim,

AVG is one of the better AV programs.  I've been using it for a while and it is one of the least resource intensive AV programs I've used.  It updates several times a day (I have the paid for version, the free version updates once a day).

 

[Jackliz]

Jim,

AVG is one of the better AV programs.  I've been using it for a while and it is one of the least resource intensive AV programs I've used.  It updates several times a day (I have the paid for version, the free version updates once a day).

AVG? Where do I find that?

Thanks,
Liz

 

[Jim Dick]

Just search the internet for AVG antivirus. It's free.

 

[Ned]

AVG is from www.grisoft.com.?

 

[Tom]

Ned, there's usually a good reason you use one software package instead of another. What makes AVG your preferred AV product?

TIA

 

[Ned]

I stopped using Norton products several years ago when they became resource hogs.  Also very prone to crashing my nearly crashproof Windows XP.  Then I tried Panda AV, because I could get a free license through ZDNet.  It worked ok, but also tended to crash periodically and used a lot of memory.  Then I tried AVG and it uses much less memory, has no discernable affect on other processes, and just works.  It updates several times a day in the background.  It hooks into the email streams without any configuration of the email client (unlike Norton) and is very configurable.

 

[Tom]

Thanks for the explanation Ned. NAV and/or NIS certainly seem to be resource hogs. Unfortunately, my Norton subscription doesn't run out until 2/2007. I think I'll go ahead and install AVG on the new notebook and Chris' desktop (both currently running evaluation versions of NAV). How quickly do they (Grisoft) respond to new threats? I know you said they update several times a day, but I was wondering how current the updates are with respect to the latest threats. OTOH I couldn't answer that question for Norton either.

 

[Ned]

About as quick as any AV software.  Like all good AV programs, it has a heuristic analyzer that tries to catch new viruses based on their behaviour.  Since I use MailWasher and never actually download most email, I rarely see a virus in my email.  Using an email client that doesn't render HTML also helps avoid infections.  And, of course, I never open attachments unless I am expecting one.  If people would just use common sense and decent email clients, there wouldn't be any need for an AV program at all.

 

[blueblood]

Thanks for the explanation Ned. NAV and/or NIS certainly seem to be resource hogs. Unfortunately, my Norton subscription doesn't run out until 2/2007. I think I'll go ahead and install AVG on the new notebook and Chris' desktop (both currently running evaluation versions of NAV). How quickly do they (Grisoft) respond to new threats? I know you said they update several times a day, but I was wondering how current the updates are with respect to the latest threats. OTOH I couldn't answer that question for Norton either.

In a notice to company administrators this week, it was stated that virus writers have adopted a new strategy to defeat virus checkers. They no longer are doing long development strings but rather put out a very short script to check to see the results and then move on to next piece of the work. The result is that administrators were advised that one must update every three hours to be protected. They added that unfortunately most virus checking companies are not doing any better than every 10 hours in developing protection responses. In short, its going to get a lot tougher over weeks ahead.

 

[Tom]

it has a heuristic analyzer that tries to catch new viruses based on their behaviour.

I learned something new again.

Your message has some good advice for folks, thanks.

 

[Tom]

In short, its going to get a lot tougher over weeks ahead.

Was that the good news or the bad news Leo? 

 

[Terry A. Brewer]

Ned

>>It hooks into the email streams without any configuration of the email client (unlike Norton) and is very configurable.<<


On my free edition I have to manually configure it....Does the pay edition automatically do PocoMail & Gmail?


Terry
At Clark Fork, ID

 

[Ned]

It seems to hook any POP3 or SMTP email stream.  You can control those individually.  I'm not sure about GMail as it uses a nonstandard port but it should work with PocoMail on standard (port 110) POP3 accounts.