Citypainter Posted March 22, 2004 Share Posted March 22, 2004 I know this is not really fish related but we are all web users here. Everyday I get about 20 or so emails at least. And everyday my PC detects at least 5 viruses being sent to my inbox from people that I have never met. It's rediculous. Don't people realise that their machine is infected? This netsky virus and and some other called Your document or your website or your some thing or other is continually turning up. What can be done about it? Any answers would be appreciated. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lee Miller Posted March 22, 2004 Share Posted March 22, 2004 Hi Citypainter, I get them too. I just delete them straight away - I haven't found any other way of dealing with them, but I sure would like a few hints too! Cheers, Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
YeW Posted March 22, 2004 Share Posted March 22, 2004 Hi Guys - I get them all - sometimes I even open them. but then again thanks to my OS, my PC is immune to 99.99% of them. On the downside I cant run Photoshop or Internet Explorer . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cichlids_au Posted March 22, 2004 Share Posted March 22, 2004 I was getting them and Norton kept stripping the attachment. I get bugger all now days. Optusnet have introduced a Spam filter for their customers and it's a treat, biggest thing since sliced bread. Logged onto my account and activated it, I hardly get any more now and they get you to e-mail the ones that slip through so they can add it to the software. My online e-mail Spam folder is chocka-block. It is automatically deleted after 14 days. If you have broadband and remain connected 24/7 there are some handshake programs you can use. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fiona Posted March 22, 2004 Share Posted March 22, 2004 Spam filters *can* filter out wanted emails. I am getting the same thing. Lots of viruses, lots of spam. I use mailwasher to filter my email before I download it. I manually delete the viruses and spam before they leave the server (just a check box). And I run AVG anti virus (up to date always). Both these products are available no charge. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chorrylan Posted March 22, 2004 Share Posted March 22, 2004 I use a virus checker (AVG) on my mailserver to block any virii aimed at me or any of my clients. I can see no valid reason whatsoever for the ISP's *not* to do this for their clients. Spam detection is trickier as you have to be careful about false positives but the only possible reason I can think of for ISP's not to run virus checkers is because they get to charge you for the downloads even if they're infected and spam ridden. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ducksta Posted March 22, 2004 Share Posted March 22, 2004 Dave, just a heads up. There are some rumours circulating that some rogue IT professionals (obviously big Fans of Microsoft? ) are currently working on a super-virus to specifically target non-MS OS's (ie. Unix) as they are sick of hearing about people and their "immunity". Its a sad world when people have that much time on their hands IMHO. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
catalyst Posted March 22, 2004 Share Posted March 22, 2004 If you keep getting viruses through your email I would suggest changing ISP's to one with a virus filter, it works great for me. All you linux people correct me it I am wrong, but the only reason linux dosent get virisus is not because it is better but because it is a less common OS and viruses are written to target Windows I believe linux is just a vunerable but it is not worth the effort. Cheers Garry Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ducksta Posted March 22, 2004 Share Posted March 22, 2004 Garry, that is exactly what I am alluding to It seems some people though, have decided it is worth the effort. Alot of poorly protected web servers will crumble if anyone did bother to write a virus targetting Unix/Unix hybrids. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Gutty Posted March 23, 2004 Share Posted March 23, 2004 What P's me off is that someone out there has my address in their address book and luckily for me it's my address the virus chooses to pick up and run with. Not only am i getting about 10 a day from complete strangers but i'm also getting about 3-4 per day apparently being bounced back to me from people not in my address book. So many people out there are probably thinking i've sent them the virus when infact it's come from some one elses machine that happens to have my email address in their address book..........bloody pain in the bot-bot........aarrrggghhhh And for those wondering, yes i update my Norton every week, and am positive i don't have any virus. Lata Matt Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ducksta Posted March 23, 2004 Share Posted March 23, 2004 Gutty, you'll probably find the virus chooses to "run with" all the addresses this guy has. And everybody who your "recieving" from is in the same boat as you And the bloke (or lady) who is actually infected has no idea, and is none-the-wiser. (Although strange things probably happen on their machine every day which they then put down to themselves pushing something wrong) It is very frustrating, and as much as web-based mail is known for its massive SPAM attracting properties, I would rather have a constantly changing hotmail account (to keep ahead of the SPAM flood) than hand out my ISP/Outlook addresses to people willy nilly. ps. My current hotmail account is over 12 months old though, and still isn't prone to SPAM floods *touches wood* I recieve a couple a week at worst. You just have to be cautious what you sign yourself up for. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chester Posted March 23, 2004 Share Posted March 23, 2004 My hotmail account is about 8 years old. Way before Microsoft started running it and I just accept that I will get heaps of junk mail everyday. I think the ISP's around the world should be responsible and instal virus scanners on their mail servers. Our ISP scans our mail, our internal MS Exchange server scans our mail as a backup (just in case something gets through) and our PC's all have anti virus scanners on them. We have never had a virus infect a PC. Touch wood. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
azz Posted March 23, 2004 Share Posted March 23, 2004 Just with regards to Linux being vulnerable, whilst i am not saying that it is impossible for a viurs to spread, Linux/Unix systems are inhernetly safer, due to both design reasons and user reasons. Design wise, linux is open source, a lot of safety comes via design transperancy in that every can see the code to how it operates. In the same way that ppl spend time to write viruii, a lot more ppl spend time finding flaws in the linux and fixing them. A lot less ports are open by default on a linux system, allowing less avenues of attack, and less services run on a linux system at such a high access privelage then windows machines. The list goes on. User wise, your everyday user doesnt usually use Linux, the more exp. computer does, therefore they know what they are doing more often then not, and are more prepared to set the system up against attacks of various kinds. FYI i am a Windows user, I dont use linux never have, i like to double click an icon and not have to type a crap load - and / flags after every command just to spit out the contents of a directory. Again i am not saying its impossible for linux to get a virus, just a whole lot less likey. Cheers Aaron. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter_Gun_Riff Posted March 23, 2004 Share Posted March 23, 2004 spyware is also a problem i got 400 hits yesterday alone and the first time i used ad aware i got 1000 or so this is a must i just ran it then and i got 275 from last nights and this mornings use Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chester Posted March 23, 2004 Share Posted March 23, 2004 PGR, you must be going to a lot of websites to get that much spyware installed on your PC. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ducksta Posted March 23, 2004 Share Posted March 23, 2004 PGR, that relates more to do with where you spend your time online, and what online services (ie messanger programs) you use. Where you been boy? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Gutty Posted March 23, 2004 Share Posted March 23, 2004 Don't mind a bit of porn then PGR..... I have that problem after my little bro jumps on and has a quick 30min surf........... If only he'd bother to check my inbox he'd see hundreds sent to me from his friends.........on a daily basis......little porn freaks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
YeW Posted March 23, 2004 Share Posted March 23, 2004 Hi All - Linux systems are, as Andreas says, significantly more secure than Windows. I use Linux and have not have any viruses - despite being sent LOTS!. The main reason for this is: 1. Linux uses protocols which are open source - so everyone knows how the bits of linux communicate with each other. Windows internal workings are largely secret and kept that way by Microsoft. This means as Azz states that ppl are constantly tweaking, examing etc open source code. 2. Most viruses target programs (such as Outlook) instead of protocols (as described above). 3. The user structure of UNIX based systems ie: root vs user file permissions means that destructive code can only be run on files that one particular user has access to. At present almost 0 viruses are known to infect linux systems in the "wild". While linux aint perfect, I have my list of gripes. It is IMHO better than the alternative for dealing with virii. The list of known linux viruses is about 5 or so. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Willy Wombat Posted March 23, 2004 Share Posted March 23, 2004 Arghhhh. People are speaking computer language.... (not my forte). But i get lots of email virus things too. So annoying! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter_Gun_Riff Posted March 23, 2004 Share Posted March 23, 2004 Don't mind a bit of porn then PGR..... this computers used by 7 other people so you never know lol Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Gutty Posted March 23, 2004 Share Posted March 23, 2004 Ahhh, excuses excuses............ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter_Gun_Riff Posted March 23, 2004 Share Posted March 23, 2004 pornos for people who dont get any lol do u get any? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Citypainter Posted March 23, 2004 Author Share Posted March 23, 2004 Everytime I get 1 of these viruses sent to I have been blocking the sender. But from what you people tell me it's not the person whose name is on the sender ID. So you are saying that it is from the infected persons address book masquerading as the sender. Is this right? I am on broadband with optus so now I am gonna check out if I got spam filter and see if I can cut this continous attack down. Thank God for nortons anti virus or I would need 2 PC's. One for my work stuff and 1 for my fish stuff. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ducksta Posted March 23, 2004 Share Posted March 23, 2004 That is how alot of virii are spreading at present, with the fake sender name and the infected party not being disclosed. There are other ones now, which are attacking Email servers, and not infecting them, but distributing emails to all users on that server (example, a bulk email to all users of "@sydneycichlid.com" domain). With an attatchment. The email (which actually originates from the correct Port on an email server to have been sent by the email administrators) says that there have been security breaches and you should run the attatched program to check for breaches of your system. DONT. It is really nasty. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Citypainter Posted March 23, 2004 Author Share Posted March 23, 2004 Funny you should say that Ducksta because I have my busibess web page hosted at webhost and I got 2 of those emails yesterday. I forwarded them to the web host mob and they are working on them right now. Tnhey said that they have not had this type of attack in years. The email said at the bottom "Thanks from the paintthehouse team" I new it had to be a virus because I am the paintthehouse team. Anyway, I just activated my spam filter with Optus and the same with my "paintthehouse" accounts. Just a nusence that such measures have to be taken. I'm a house painter and fish lover but I am quickly becoming a PC technicion. Well sort of anyway. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.