|
Trick your address book!
Who among us doesn't know someone who has experienced the embarrassment of unknowingly spreading a computer virus via their email address book? It's time to STOP this from happening by TAKING CONTROL of your email program! For those who are unaware, many computer viruses spread themselves by sending themselves to everyone in your address book. Imagine how you would feel if you were unknowingly infected with a computer virus, and worse yet, your friends, family, and business contacts were being targeted by your computer! Well, if you want to avoid this sort of thing, here's a great tip: This tip won't prevent YOU from getting any viruses (you have to scan those attachments yourself before opening them to do that), but it will stop a virus from latching onto your address book and sending itself out to others. To avoid spreading computer viruses, create a contact in your email address book with the name : 0000 (or similar) with no email address in the details. This contact will then show up as your first contact in your book. If a virus attempts to do a "send all" on your contact list, your PC will put up an error message saying that: "The Message could not be sent. One or more recipients do not have an e-mail address. Please check your Address Book and make sure all the recipients have a valid e-mail address." You click on OK and the offending (virus) message would not have been sent to anyone. Of course no changes have been made to your original contacts list. The offending (virus) message MAY then be automatically stored in your "Drafts" or "Outbox" folder. In some programs it doesn't try to store it, but if yours does, just go in the folder where it stored it and delete the offending message. Problem is solved and virus is not spread. Some of you may need the additional step that I had to take to get this to work with Outlook Express. It wouldn't allow me to create a new contact with no email address, so I had to create one named 00000 with the address "none." And, when I sent an email to it, it sent! Of course, it will come back to me undeliverable. Then, I went into the properties for that contact and removed that email address and hit "OK." Viola! An entry with no email address. This is a GREAT idea. I wonder why someone didn't think of it sooner! Try this and pass on to your email contacts. The more people that use this technique, the less vulnerable we will all be to viruses that spread without our knowledge by auto launching themselves to every one in your address book! Kathleen |
