Apparently you have not heard about BubbleBoy:
About the BubbleBoy virus:
The BubbleBoy virus is the first of its kind in the fact that an
attachment is not necessary in order to activate the virus. This is
caused by a security flaw in Internet Explorer and the fact that
Microsoft Outlook automatically opens email messages in a lower window
in the program. The virus found so far by researchers though has no
features that would delete or harm existing files, but its expected that
variations will soon come into play that will.
What does it do?
The virus will change your email settings so that your name (registered
owner) is set to BubbleBoy and the organization is set to Vandelay
Industries, the ficticious company that George used in several episodes
as job references. The body of the message says "The BubbleBoy incident,
pictures and sound" while the subject line is "BubbleBoy is Back!".
After viewing, the self replicating worm virus sends the same email to
everyone in the user's Outlook address book.
What can you do to prevent it?
Microsoft has a security patch available for the security flaw, as of
August 31, that removes security vulnerabilities with two Active X
controls. The patch can be downloaded here. Also the virus requires IE
5 with Windows Scripting Host installed, which is the
standard configuration for Windows 98 and Windows 2000, but won't work
on Windows NT or the default Windows 95 settings.
Also, removing the preview pane on Microsoft Outlook can allow you to
delete the messages before getting infected. All the major anti-virus
vendors also have updates to catch the virus before infection as well.
Quoted from:
http://bubbleboy.8m.com/bubble-boy.html
Additional info at:
http://www.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/vbs.bubbleboy.html
--
Daniel
---
Daniel M. Vance & Associates
Internet/Intranet Design & Support
Ph(520)797-2225 Fax(520)297-0348
mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.vancesystems.com
http://www.vancesystems.com/scuba
Tucson, Arizona USA
Ed Esgro wrote:
>
> It is equivilant to reading the message if you have the option set to mark
> as read from preview pane. You aren't opening the message unless you double
> click it. Plus most of the recent viruses, are only launched by their
> attachments. I have yet to see a virus launch from preview pane, but if
> there was one, I would be screwed because I have my outlook setup that way.
> Now that would be a dangerous virus. Imagine how fast that would spread.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Hoxie, Glenn [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> Sent: Wednesday, September 26, 2001 9:14 AM
> To: NT 2000 Discussions
> Subject: Viruses & Outlook
>
> Given this surge of virus discussions in this discussion group, I wanted to
> ask a quick question.
>
> If a person has the preview pane enabled on their Outlook client, isn't this
> the equivalent of opening the message? Many thanks!
>
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