Everyday there seems to be a new and more
destructive e-mail virus that has been unleashed on the world by
some disgruntled hacker. In most cases these viruses exploit
vulnerabilities in Microsoft Exchange/Outlook e-mail services. In
many of these cases these vulnerabilities do not exist in GroupWise
hence the malicious code will not do any damage here.
At Gonzaga all e-mail messages are scanned
for viruses as they pass through our firewall. If an infected
message is sent to you from someone outside Gonzaga, you will
receive a message from Gonzaga’s scanning software informing you
that you were sent an infected message. In most cases you will
receive the “cleaned” message from the sender, and the sender will
be sent a message from Gonzaga notifying them that they are spewing
infected e-mail.
If there is a new virus that we are
vulnerable to, we will send out a message to the staff informing you
of what actions should be taken to prevent infection. Take the
following steps to prevent your computer from being infected by an
e-mail virus: 1) Do not open any e-mail attachment that is an *.exe
file 2) Do not have the Quickviewer open (it may cause an *.exe fill
to begin running in the background)
A new phenomenon is e-mail hoaxes. In many
cases you will receive a frightening e-mail from a friend saying
that a new and even deadlier virus is on the loose. To protect
yourself you must delete a file that is amazingly already on you
computer. 99.99999% of the time that file you are instructed to
delete is a file that runs some part of your computers Operating
System. Deleting it could make your computer unusable.
If an e-mail warning of the impending
destruction of man is sent to you before you do anything rash or
bombard the NOC of Gonzaga with questions and/or your own fears of
Armageddon, visit one of the following websites and see if it is a
know hoax. All of these sites have virus libraries and by typing in
a short description of the message and searching their databases,
you will get a detailed history, threat and solution (if you already
deleted the file).
1.
Symantec (Norton)
www.symantec.com/avcenter/hoax.html
2.
Hoax Busters: The Big List
http://hoaxbusters.org
3.
Vmyths.com
www.vmyths.com
4.
Jeff Richard’s Virus Hoaxes and
Netlore
http://hoaxinfo.com
