Re: Frethern virus going around
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On Tue, Jul 16, 2002 at 03:29:01PM -0400, Mike Dresser wrote:
> You'd think someone at stanford might know what virus protection is.
While I appreciate the intent of the original message, I must warn
*against* mass mailing people warning about viruses.
Virus writers are viruses themselves, they spread by people giving thier
creations hype. Please don't spread the hype/panic. By the time it's a
threat and long before people start emailing warnings about it, NAI,
Symantec, Grisoft, and the other antivirus package creators already know
about them. You can keep up to date yourself by checking thier
databases, which are open to the public.
http://vil.mcafee.com/http://vil.mcafee.com/
http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/vinfodb.html
Be smart. Things you can do to keep yourself safe, in order from easiest
to hardest (the harder ones tend to be more effective):
1) Use an effective virus scanner. AVG distributes a free (closed
source, so not quite Free[1]) self-updating virus scanner. I have it
mirrored at http://ursine.dyndns.org/~baloo/software/avg6277fu.exe.
(It's hard to find and they want personal information if you get it from
thier website or download.com). Whenever there's a Windows machine in
the house, I offer to install it for them, I swear by it for Windows
users.
Firewalls will not protect you against pretty much every virus
in existance. Don't pretend they will. I'm not saying to be lax about
security, as firewalls are an important part of protecting your network.
Most out there are only intended to make it a little trickier for some
random cracker[2] to get in.
2) Shut off the preview pane and set the security level to restricted in
Outlook and OE (check the options and click around the menus, it varies
from version to version). Never open attachments you don't know what
they are ahead of time, whether or not you trust the source.
3) Use some other mail reader other than Outlook or OE. Mozilla is a
Free (open source) web browser and mail client avalible for at least 10
different operating systems on at least 4 architectures. It's avalible
from http://mozilla.org/. AOL distributes thier own (semi-broken and
adware) version of Mozilla under the name Netscape 6.
4) Use an operating system that makes it difficult for a virus to exist.
My personal recommendation is Debian Linux (http://debian.org/) and I'm
plenty happy to help with getting that installed for you. If you would
rather not have to download Debian, I can UPS you a CD of Debian, or any
other distribution of your choice, for the cost of shipping and media.
Many other people out there also highly recommend Mach/MacOS X for the
PPC architecture, assuming you're not running it on top of OS 9. I can
also get you Debian for m68k and PPC.
5) Total abstience. Remove your system from all networks and don't
install anything that doesn't go through your hands or that you don't
trust. I find the best balance to be around idea 4.
[1] My idea of Free differs slightly from free. And according to recent
studies, about 5% of home users and 25% of businesses agree with me on
this one. http://www.debian.org/social_contract#guidelines
[2] http://ursine.dyndns.org/jargon/html/entry/cracker.html . This is
different from a hacker, and it annoys those of us who fall under the
latter term when people use it the wrong way (Eric S Raymond
(http://tuxedo.org/~esr/) has even made special mention of it in several
of his books). Hackers are the ones that created the internet, run the
servers that deliver your email, and in some cases, are the ones
answering your calls for help when you call tech support.
- --
Baloo
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