Re: computer viruses

[Terry Thorsen <tthorsen70 at shaw_ca>]

Can't Majordomo be configured to simply bounce or reject email containing
attachments?  Seems this might be a better solution than stripping?  The
virus attack seems rather suspicious given the amount of time it has
persisted.  Any other person on the infected systems address book would have
been sent a virus and notified the person of trouble by now.

Terry

> Date: Fri, 24 Jan 2003 04:22:03 -0800 (PST)
> From: "S. Hieber" <shieber at yahoo_com>
> Subject: Re: Computer Viruses
>
> Some of these programs, which is what viruses are, raid
> mailing lists when they infect a computer and use the
> listings as "sender" names when it sallies forth to infect
> other systems.  Some of these programs keep going on their
> own, mechanically, persistently, annoyingly. Like
> graffitti, spit and chewing gum on the sidewalk, and other
> thoughtless or malicious acts, these buggers aren't going
> to go away -- they're a part of life when computer systems
> are connected to each other.
>
> Many of these don't do any damage beyond taking up time and
> intruding -- they're just ugly benign intrusions.  Some
> will ruin your bits and bytes.  Luckily, it's pretty easy
> to avoid damage and to keep things at bay -- remove or
> cover graffiti as soon as it shows up (this works much
> better and more often than you might think); watch where
> you step; get decent firewall and antivirus program(s)
> (there are even free ones that are decent).
>
> The amount of time it takes everyone combined to skip over
> a stripped message in a list of APD posts is probably less
> than the itme it would take to manually delete them.  so
> the net welfare to folks might be less if they are removed
> rather than merely stripped.