minchton Posted September 19, 2002 Report Share Posted September 19, 2002 A general warning to all. I have recently picked up two nasty viruses which nobody was able to rid me of. It would appear possible that I picked these up from or through this forum. Please I am not accusing or blaming anybody but on two recent occassions I have received e-mails purporting to come from fnzas members and both were garbled and did horrible things to my screen. As a consequence I have lost all my records of e-mail replies to the forum and am now asking that if you have sent me an e-mail could you please resend as I have lost some very important information. Especially re White clouds and Brine shrimp. Thank you all and sorry to bring bad tidings Mitch Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ajbroome Posted September 19, 2002 Report Share Posted September 19, 2002 Mitch said... > ...but on two recent occassions I have received e-mails > purporting to come from fnzas members... There has been at least one nasty virus that I feel is being (accidentily, no doubt) distributed from someone in the FNZAS. To make matters worse (for me especially), it's one that 'spoofs' the senders address to hide it's real source and since my name often appears at the top of people address book (starting with a 'a' as it does) there was a period when a lot of virus containing e-mail appeared to be coming from me (both my work address and my home one). I'm convinced that I was not the source in either case... but looking at the messages I was getting back, it did appear to be from someone who regularly mails FNZAS people (one of the reasons I feel it wasn't coming from me is that I got messages from a lot of people but the only ones I knew were FNZAS people, not any of the others in my address book). Anyway, it's a nasty piece of work but can be avoided using the usual techniques and cleaned up using good anti-virus software. Use GOOGLE to search on the name of the virus and you should be able to find a cure. Andrew. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Caryl Posted September 19, 2002 Report Share Posted September 19, 2002 Can viruses actually be spread through this forum (ie through PMs) or only if the infected computer sends an email to a fishroom member? It is a concern when things like this happen but I thought everybody should have up to date anti-virus software these days plus anyone with Xtra has theirs checked as well. Our anti virus updates automatically whenever a new update is created. We get a number of messages sent to us with the virus already removed by Xtra. As extra precaution we also have a firewall. Don't know whether this helps in the virus department as that's Grant's area of expertise, not mine, and he is out at the moment. If anyone knows it is their computer which is infected, but doesn't know how to fix it, give me a call, I may be able to help (well, Grant may be able to). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cees Posted September 19, 2002 Report Share Posted September 19, 2002 Can viruses actually be spread through this forum (ie through PMs) No Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Goldie Posted September 21, 2002 Report Share Posted September 21, 2002 ty Cees. Like Caryl I am with xtra and also have up to date anti virus thingie. However I also appreciate the forum and the precautions you have taken in setting it up - so once again ty ty Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cees Posted September 21, 2002 Report Share Posted September 21, 2002 Thanks Goldie An email virus (or any other computer virus) as such can not be spread using the forum. What I do find lately is an aweful lot of 'spam' ie junk email in my email inbox everyday. I guess that's the penalty for posting my email address on the internet. ([email protected] is of course a real giveaway). Luckily I'm in the position to filter out a lot of these junk mails at the mailserver but I will have to become more rigorous doing that. I'm contemplating simply denying all emails except send to me by people who are on my 'allowed list' . Anyone else noticed an increase in Junk email lately. Cees Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Caryl Posted September 21, 2002 Report Share Posted September 21, 2002 Yes. We rarely used to get spam but now get about 6 a week (still not much by many standards). Dukes Casino keeps trying to get Grant to gamble his money (little do they know he hasn't got any ) away, the Nigerians keep trying to tell us they will share their millions if we would just tell them our bank account number, and lots of Asian companies want to sell us fish (many not legal here - never mind the fact that we can't order them anyway) and aquatic products. Oh yes, I forgot about Mrs Sese-Seko, widow of the late Zaire president Mobutu Sese-Seko. It seems her husband managed to deposit billions of dollars in a Swiss bank account before he died and she is offering big remuneration to anyone stupid enough to assist her in recovering the cash. :lol: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bowhunter Posted September 21, 2002 Report Share Posted September 21, 2002 i've gotten all those as well caryl. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Caryl Posted September 21, 2002 Report Share Posted September 21, 2002 Worldwide equal opportunities. Ain't the Net wonderful? :lol: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bruce Posted September 21, 2002 Report Share Posted September 21, 2002 Re above, We are also getting the ones about people having millions of dollars to give away...why cant they just send me the cash :lol: I suspect these ones are coming through the Killie Fish mailing list though As for viruses I have not had any but I do run Nortons which is updated weekly Mitch.. I will resend the white cloud emails if you require them /Bruce Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joey Posted September 22, 2002 Report Share Posted September 22, 2002 Another commoon virus that "masks" the sender is one that comes in spanish or another similar language, I have received about 50 of these in the last couple of weeks, luckily I have the latest in anti-virus and it filters it. It quite often has a large file size and gets to be very annoying. The best way to recognize most of these viruses is that it comes in under the person email address, not the name that you have listed under. If you know what I mean. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ajbroome Posted September 22, 2002 Report Share Posted September 22, 2002 Bruce said... > I suspect these ones are coming through the Killie Fish > mailing list though If you mean AUNZZA then there are a few SPAM messages coming in from time to time. Unfortunately because there isn't much actual traffic at the moment, the SPAM to good content ratio is kinda high :-( Andrew. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Warren Posted September 23, 2002 Report Share Posted September 23, 2002 Get some decent virus scanning software. I am IT manager at my work (amoungst other things) and we've never been infected by a virus ever. We get sent approx 5 a day out of the 600-700 emails sent to us. Our virus software stops on it quick. We are permanently connected to the internet through a firewall and broadband connection. As long as you have good scanning software, keep it very up-to-date and are sensible about what files you try to open, you will be ok. For the cost of the software it is well worth it. Think of it like this, $125 for scanning software or reformat and reinstall OS, hmmm... I'll take the $125 and get the software any day!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Caryl Posted September 23, 2002 Report Share Posted September 23, 2002 Does IT manager stand for International Travelling manager? :lol: Anyone who doesn't use anti-virus software these days is asking for trouble. We would love to have a permanent connection but alas, it is not possible from where we are and we are not even on the list of places to be upgraded. Not enough of us minions for Telecom to give a stuff about. :evil: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Warren Posted September 23, 2002 Report Share Posted September 23, 2002 No, IT stand for 'it', - Warren can you fix it? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Caryl Posted September 23, 2002 Report Share Posted September 23, 2002 :lol: :lol: You obviously aren't a round to it Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
john1 Posted September 23, 2002 Report Share Posted September 23, 2002 Hi Caryl You said you would like a permanent connection. Do you mean ADSL? Bacause if you do then it is even more dangerous reg invasion. Unless you have a good firewall. ADSL uses the same ip address all the time. Whereas a dial-up modem changes the ip address to a different one each time you dial up. Far more difficult to hack. John Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Caryl Posted September 23, 2002 Report Share Posted September 23, 2002 We run a computer company from home John (and Grant worked for Telecom for 33 years) so we know all the pros and cons regarding permanent connections . Yes, we have a very good firewall thanks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cees Posted September 23, 2002 Report Share Posted September 23, 2002 We would love to have a permanent connection ... Same here, I look out of my window and accross the street I see the Saturn cable just sitting there. When I follow the cable to the start of Akatarawa road I see some bare wires dangling there. Turns out it's not connected, abandoned by the company.... aaargghh You said you would like a permanent connection. Do you mean ADSL? Bacause if you do then it is even more dangerous reg invasion. Unless you have a good firewall. If you have an old 486 then a firewall is easy-peasy, and they don't cost $. Some of them don't even need a harddrive but fit on a single floppy. http://www.ipcop.org/ http://lrp.steinkuehler.net/ http://www.zelow.no/floppyfw/ to quote " ..one of these floppies booting on an old 'doorstop' 486 machine will be faster and more reliable than a windows based software firewall running on your desktop Pentium 2 (try running windows off a floppy disk with 12 Megs of RAM :-)....." Anyway, where's the tropical fish in this again ;-) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cees Posted September 23, 2002 Report Share Posted September 23, 2002 Get some decent virus scanning software. I am IT manager at my work (amoungst other things) and we've never been infected by a virus ever. We get sent approx 5 a day out of the 600-700 emails sent to us. Our virus software stops on it quick. We are permanently connected to the internet through a firewall and broadband connection. Warren, what do you use to scan for spam? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Caryl Posted September 23, 2002 Report Share Posted September 23, 2002 Anyway, where's the tropical fish in this again? This is the technical section Cees and we don't want our fish to catch viruses do we? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ira Posted September 24, 2002 Report Share Posted September 24, 2002 You mean you don't have a firewall and antivirus on the computer in your fish's tank? Don't want my Geo's picking up any viruses from spam or my mystus picking up a virus while surfing for porn on planetcatfish.com. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Warren Posted September 24, 2002 Report Share Posted September 24, 2002 Hi Cees, We currently use MDaemon for email. It has inbuilt spam blocking using an internet based spam cache. Its very good and only rejects the odd email that is almost genuine. If you are silly enough to put a subject title like "Pictures for you" or "Check This Out" then of course it will be rejected. Generally it is very good. It does not however stop people who have bought your email address from the scumbags who collect and sell them from targeting you with their crap!! Virus scanning is done using Norton Antivirus Corporate Edition Ver 7.6 It is very good too. It automatically rolls out to any new machine connected to the system. It checks all PC's on the network every 2 minutes to see if they are up-to-date. It checks Nortons website every hour for new updates. If it finds a files / email that has a signature it does not recognise it does this; quarantines the file on the central quarantine server, emails the virus the symantec who create a fix within 24 hours who then send it back to our server. It fixes the file if it can and delivers it back where it found it. If it cannot fix it, it emails me and I can then make the decision to destroy it or not. Its about the highest level of virus security you can get (also quite pricey - about $4500 including licences). Its only a fraction of the cost of getting a virus that spreads throughout the company however. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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