The most underhand virus email yet!

[Cyberus]

From:    admin@yahoo.co.uk | This is not spam | Add to Address Book
To:    removed my address @yahoo.co.uk
Subject:   your account eqzeomao
   


Hello there,

I would like to inform you about important information regarding your
email address. This email address will be expiring.
Please read attachment for details.

---
Best regards, Administrator
eqzeomao

the attachment was called message.zip

 

I know there will be those of you that will say 'serves someone right if they open it' but this is the nastiest I've seen!

[mikeymike]

Yes, "serves the right if they open it", but explained:

 * There are "rules of thumb" about not taking stupid risks in life.  The most basic are ones like "don't talk to strangers", etc.  People should expect there to be with the Internet as well, but many don't because they prefer to act and remain ignorant, because "it's not cool to know your stuff with computers".

 * Why would I have to read an attachment for details when it could be written in plain text in the email?

 * Pretty much from day one, if I thought an attachment could be dodgy, I manually virus-scanned it with an up-to-date scanner.  Nowadays I know that is spam/dodgy straight away and would just ignore/delete it.

 * Presumably people being targetted by this virus have yahoo accounts.  If not, what are they thinking in opening the attachment?

 * What's inside the attachment, an executable?

The only thing I would say in defence of the idiot population is that companies should inform their customers when they open accounts with them, how they will communicate them, what to expect and not to expect.  For example, if there was a widespread/common problem with "accounts expiring", the company should direct the user to a URL on their website.  The user then knows (with a fair amount of certainty) that the information is genuine.  The company should also say in no uncertain terms that they'll never send attachments, or ask for passwords, etc.

[weirdami]

I wonder if there's a way to filter messages that have those funky letters on the end of the subject. Lots of spams have those and they're a quick scam indicator.

[Lo]

McCaffe spam filter catches spam with "too many letters in subject line" if that helps.

[Cyberus]

that's all very well mikeymike, but you can't expect everyone to be a computer expert - what about a young child or an elderly person who has just started using the internet

people on amiga.org are at the more 'expert' end of the spectrum, so granted, they should know better...but what of someone who has started using the internet this week?

[mikeymike]

that's all very well mikeymike, but you can't expect everyone to be a computer expert - what about a young child or an elderly person who has just started using the internet

I guess I can't expect people to use their brains, know what they know and more specifically that they don't know about things such as the Internet and play things a little more sensibly.  Like ditching the MS web/mail client for starters.  Instead there's a million and one news articles about the dangers of the Internet purely designed to scaremonger, and that's about it.  All the important issues are avoided, and any news articles about virus warnings fail to point out that most of them target MS mail clients!

Why are email viruses so popular?  Because people are stupid.  No other reason.  If people weren't stupid, they'd use something other than an MS mail client for starters.  If they're clued up enough to know not to use MS mail clients, then they're clued up enough to be trusted to find out about the rest.

Now what do we have?  Loads of clueless users with firewall software installed, because people tell them "that'll keep them safe".   They have no idea how packet filters or firewalls work, they don't want to know either, then they complain when things break because they're clueless, ARGH!  It makes me mad!  Making a situation even more complicated than it already is is not a solution!

All it needs is for people to exercise caution!  Take time to learn how to do things in a safe and secure manner.

[amigamad]

I only ever open email i expect to get or have sighned up for my yahoo acount gets tons of crap any attachment with yahoo can be scanned using their own virus scanner before downloading or opening. :-)

[mikeymike]

I only ever open email i expect to get

That's a reasonable first step of caution.

any attachment with yahoo can be scanned using their own virus scanner before downloading or opening.

That isn't.  Don't rely on someone else's security system.

[Cyberus]

I understand what you mean, I always felt aggreived that (as someone who did an undergraduate degree in Physics n Astrophysics and then a Masters in X-ray science) people don't understand when they get an x-ray what is happening, or seeing a woman on the underground in London trying to make a mobile call and wondering why it wasn't working, or someone not knowing how a satellite can be geostationary, but then I realised I was being an arsehole.....

I mean, don't you think its arrogant to suggest that people should be looked down upon because they don't know as much about a subject as you?

I mean, if a polyglot came along and called you STUPID for not speaking five languages like he does, wouldn't you think he's being unreasonable? I mean, he could argue that YOU should've taken the time to learn....

Or imagine if you had a car that you crashed, and the garage where you took it to be repaired called you a halfwit because you didn't "Take time to learn how to do things in a safe and secure manner."

The fault lies with the arseholes (who are probably socially inept, as they haven't taken the time to learn how to interact with other people ;-)) who write the viruses...

Whilst I understant your points, and in some instances agree with them, it seems to me that you are trying to advocate some kind of elitism whereby, 'If you're not an experienced systems analyst or a computer programmer, then your data deserves a trashing anyway'

[mikeymike]

people don't understand when they get an x-ray what is happening

I don't understand fully either, but I know roughly of the dangers of them.

I mean, don't you think its arrogant to suggest that people should be looked down upon because they don't know as much about a subject as you?

The average person not knowing as much as me on subject x has nothing to do with them learning a few basics in order not to A: make an ass out of themselves and B: annoy/endanger other people.

Or imagine if you had a car that you crashed, and the garage where you took it to be repaired called you a halfwit because you didn't "Take time to learn how to do things in a safe and secure manner."

If I ran it into a lamp post or didn't know it needed filling up with petrol, I would expect to be called a halfwit etc etc etc.

The fault lies with the arseholes (who are probably socially inept, as they haven't taken the time to learn how to interact with other people ) who write the viruses...

And no fault lies on the part of the clueless idiots who don't take precautions?  That's like saying HIV is totally a monkey's fault.

t seems to me that you are trying to advocate some kind of elitism

No, all I advocate is exercising a little caution and use of brain in environments one isn't so used to.

[Roj]

Why are email viruses so popular? Because people are stupid. No other reason. If people weren't stupid, they'd use something other than an MS mail client for starters. If they're clued up enough to know not to use MS mail clients, then they're clued up enough to be trusted to find out about the rest.

You know, I can sit back and watch as people who pretend to be know-it-alls are proven to be idiots, but you're calling 75% of the computer users today idiots, which just ain't right. I personally know people who would fit into your "idiot" classification who've accomplished more in three weeks than you probably will in your lifetime.

Half the reason people don't know what they're doing, much less care, is because Microsoft has created a facade that is Windows which has them believing they don't NEED to know anything about computers to get done what they need. And I'm not talking in this case about writing a piece of software or playing a flashy 3D game. I'm talking about work that has to be done, for example, to get a child abroad here to be with his father and mother. People simply don't have time like you do to sit and play with a computer until they know enough not to look like an idiot. To some people, sitting at a computer all day is about as much fun as watching their dishwasher wash dishes. Computers just happen to mean more to you, yet you hold it against them that computers don't mean as much to them. Back off, chill out and quit being so critical. I'm sure there's a dishwasher expert out there who'd call all of us idiots, given the chance.

[Cyberus]

That's like saying HIV is totally a monkey's fault.

:roflmao:

I still agree with much of what you said, but now the computer is no longer the preserve of the enthusiast, EVERYONE uses them. They are to this decade what the video recorder was to the 1980s - everyone's got one, but hardly anyone knows how to use it.

Unfortunately, its the world we live in - sure when you drive your car down the road, you have to remember, there's no accounting for other drivers' stupidity.

The bottom line is that you shouldn't have high expectations of people - I always did, and you quickly learn that you're soon disappointed...
 
I still think we could do without people writing viruses...and at the end of the day, they are the ones at fault (ok, they are 95% responsible :-))

[mikeymike]

You know, I can sit back and watch as people who pretend to be know-it-alls are proven to be idiots, but you're calling 75% of the computer users today idiots, which just ain't right. I personally know people who would fit into your "idiot" classification who've accomplished more in three weeks than you probably will in your lifetime.

Ok, I thought it would be inferred, but I'm calling them idiots mainly because of their cavalier attitude with computers.
As for your second sentence, more content and less insults would be appreciated.

Half the reason people don't know what they're doing, much less care, is because Microsoft has created a facade that is Windows which has them believing they don't NEED to know anything about computers to get done what they need.

The main problem is that people CHOOSE to believe it.  People CHOOSE not to take most advertising at face value, why is it different with computers?

People simply don't have time like you do to sit and play with a computer until they know enough not to look like an idiot.

Do people "have time" to learn how to drive a car before they go out and get one?

yet you hold it against them that computers don't mean as much to them

Computers don't mean much to my family and some of my friends, yet they adopt the right attitude with computers.  The people I'm talking about in this context aren't interested in computers and haven't taken a huge amount of time out to learn computers.  They don't have any problems because they follow a few basic rules of thumb I've taught them, and they know when they should try to figure something out themselves, and know when they should ask for help.

[Cyberus]

Do people "have time" to learn how to drive a car before they go out and get one?

That could be debated!

[that_punk_guy]

I think the problem is that some people simply will not ask for help with the computer, so they just guess and click randomly until they fix it or mess something else up. People seriously mess their machines up because they think, "the tech guy will always be able to fix it, might as well try on my own first," then they shout at you, "What kind of expert are you?!" when you can't work out what the hell they've done to mess their computer up so much.

I can't tell my sister anything about computers. She tells me to shut up and won't listen to any advice I try to give her. Stupid? No, insecure I'd say.