Watch Out For Viruses!

[RandallR 448]

I just received two messages with viral "care packages" attached. They were sent to the account that I use mainly for forum messaging and sim-related communications, so whoever "farmed" my address probably picked it up here at Avsim or another sim site.Luckily, my anti-virus software caught them immediately. One message was in Spanish, the other English. The virus was in attachments and the virus was the same type in each message: W32.Yaha.F@mmBe sure to update your virus signatures and be careful!Oh...One attachment was named "urfriend.scr" - the other was "DO ESTELIONATO E OUTRAS FRAUDES.doc.bat".

[Guest]

>I just received two messages with viral "care packages" >attached. They were sent to the account that I use mainly >for forum messaging and sim-related communications, so >whoever "farmed" my address probably picked it up here at >Avsim or another sim site. Randall, just a little info on how most of these latest email viruses work. These viruses infect the user's computer and then use any email address that it finds in the user's address book or in any of the user's mail folders (sent, deleted, etc) to create random emails to be sent out without the user knowing. So anyone that is infected that had previously emailed you or you had emailed them, could potentially be emailing you the virus without knowing it.I bring this up because people have been known to throw around the words "farming" or "harvesting" email addresses from the forums. In the true sense of these words, it doesn't happen in these forums. Now, if your settings make your address available to the public, someone can always click on your email icon to email you. Also, those that include their email address hardcoded in their forum posts, can be hit by spambots out there on the web running through sites to collect addresses.I just didn't want users to get the wrong impression that someone is able to "farm" or "harvest" the email address listing out of our forums.

[Guest Josve]

Yes it's getting annoying!! several mails each day with some worms inside.....but Norton does a good job :)Johnny"I'LL BE BACK"[div align=center]http://www.avsim.com/hangar/fly/josve/fly2/vas.gif][/div

[RandallR 448]

Scott,Thanks for the correction - I didn't mean to imply that Avsim was a dangerous place...far from it! Considering that this particular virus is indeed a worm that regenerates from the user's address book, my address was probably gleaned from other Avsim users that I have corresponded with. They need to check their scanning setup.Avsim's listings and setup are excellent - the fact that I have never been spammed on this address is a pretty good indicator of how secure it is. When I received the original viral packages I thought of someone laborously going through our profiles and seeking that info - of course, that's not the M.O. of spammers or viral creators.