>From The Australian on line, at: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/index.asp?URL=/national/4335786.htm Bad girl takes on Aussie e-mails By DOMINIQUE JACKSON 31mar99 AFTER crippling communications in US companies since Friday, the fast-breeding new Melissa computer virus has claimed an Australian victim. The South Australian Government was without e-mail and Internet communications for several hours on Monday. While Melissa is not believed to cause permanent damage, it has caught US businesses unaware with the speed at which it replicates. Melissa was created by an Internet user named Sky Roket through the newsgroup alt.sex last Thursday. On Monday, the US Computer Emergency Response Team had confirmed 50,000 infected computers at 100 sites worldwide. An infected user activates the virus when they open an e-mail attachment, inadvertently sending the virus to the first 50 names in their e-mail address book, if they use one, under the subject heading "important message from (name of sender)". The exponential increase in e-mail traffic can overload and crash a company's e-mail systems. At 4pm on Monday, South Australian government employees received Melissa-infected e-mails. Electronic messaging service team leader Trevor Wynne said he realised the virus was replicating when he received 10 identical e-mails at once. He warned employees to delete the suspect e-mails without opening them and he cut all Internet connections to prevent further infection, leaving the Government's 14,000 users without e-mail and Internet access. "We'd rather play it safe," he said. In the meantime, inter-departmental communication was maintained through internal e-mail systems. That night, Mr Wynne's team found 12 Melissa-infected e-mails in a total of 12,000 e-mails. The team installed anti-virus fixes on the e-mail systems and had restored all systems by yesterday morning. The full effect of the virus has yet to hit Australia. Yesterday afternoon, the Australian Computer Emergency Response Team had received fewer than 10 reports of the virus, although the Queensland University-based team's operational manager, Eric Halil, said he expected the infection to peak in the next few weeks. Local companies could fare better than US companies if they implemented safety measures in time. Mr Halil urged users not to open suspect messages, even from known senders. The emergency response team has not received any reports of the Papa virus, a variation of Melissa discovered by authorities in the US on Monday, although Mr Halil said he expected these to occur in the next few days, several days after the US. Papa sends out 60 e-mails via a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet attachment. For more information: http://www.zdnet.com/zdhelp/stories/main/0,5594,2233761-6,00.html I'd also recommend that you take a look at ZDNet's article titled "The Not So Lovely Melissa Virus at http://www.zdnet.com/zdhelp/stories/main/0,5594,2233761,00.html ZDNet's "Melissa" article is a must-read for anyone who wants to learn the inside scoop on this whole virus scare. You can find Microsoft's Melissa virus alert at http://officeupdate.microsoft.com/articles/macroalert.htm You can also read the offical CERT advisory on this virus at http://www.cert.org/advisories/CA-99-04-Melissa-Macro-Virus.html -- Leftlink - Australia's Broad Left Mailing List mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.alexia.net.au/~www/mhutton/index.html Sponsored by Melbourne's New International Bookshop Subscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=subscribe%20leftlink Unsubscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=unsubscribe%20leftlink
