Randy Cassingham's Blog

Sadly, I still get an occasion email telling me how I may be infected, but clicking on the attached "Symantec" link will check it out and remove it for me. Fortunately, my Symantec program intercepts this evil little gremlin.

But, it seems that Microsoft is currently insisting that I just MUST update my computer with some program that will check (aren't they so nice?) to see if my Windows is a Gen-yu-wine copy and, if it's not, let me know and provide a way to get a legitimate copy. Considering that I had to let them verify it when I upgraded to the Service Pack 2 and again when I downloaded IE7, I don't think it somehow became illegitimate in the meantime.

---

Yeah, that drives me nuts too -- I think Microsoft has "verified" the "validity" of my Windows at least three times on this computer. I dread that at some point it will finally decide it's not valid, and will shut it down. I figure I'll be on the road when that happens, and on deadline.... -rc

What I hate most is when I get the virus emails from family or friends who aren't quite as computer savvy as I am. They insist that Janet/Bob/Terry/Whomever is a trusted source and wouldn't lie about such a thing.

I can't seem to get across to them that the email was not actually sent by their friend, but by the virus replicating itself; just as the email I just received from them was never sent by them. Yes they did send me a copy, they say, right after they ran the virus scanner for themselves. I now have at least two copies of it in my inbox: one the virus sent out from the address book and one my friend sent me! sigh

Now if everybody would just run Macs we wouldn’t have this problem. ;-)

---

If only it were true that Macs are the answer. They are only because there are so few of them that it's not worth the trouble to target them. If "everybody" got Macs, then they would be worth that trouble. I remember a time when the ONLY viruses were the ones that were spread among -- yep! -- Macs. -rc

The same is true of Linux in its various incarnations (too few of them to be a target).

Also, Lookout (er...Outlook) is not the only email program which is or can be used to distribute malware either. And Mozilla has just as many security holes as Internet Explorer. It's just that nobody hears about them because they aren't a massive target like MS is.

There are and have been viruses for most of the operating systems in use today. Including even the ones intended for mainframes. And there are viruses that have been attached to Instant Messengers such as ICQ, AIM, and others.

The last virus that I knowingly opened came to me as an attachment from an ICQ pal. I advised him to update his AV and when I got the same virus back, I reported him to the gurus at Norton and McAfee. Then I moved him from my friends list to my ignore list. That was more than 10 years ago now.