yup, I do this too, works well. I changed my newsgroup address yesterday, as that was the only place I was getting SWEN virus hits. The new address is cunning. (I think). It works as is, and it works with the obvoius removed, but the SWEN virus will not harvest addresses with 'spam' or 'remove' in them. (-: Hopefully future viruses will be as clever
yup, we need to keep a bit of flexibility in email addresses.
swarf, steam and wind
-- David Forsyth -:- the email address is real /"\
formatting link
\ / ASCII Ribbon campaign against HTML E-Mail > - - - - - - -> X If you receive email saying "Send this to everyone you know," / \ PLEASE pretend you don't know me.
I use Pegasus Mail for email, Xnews for newsgroups. both free. Pegasus mail also integrates fully with the server software we have here (I am the supervisor), and as someone else mentioned, doe snot store all the mail in one file, and plain text editors can view it as needed.
swarf, steam and wind
-- David Forsyth -:- the email address is real /"\
formatting link
\ / ASCII Ribbon campaign against HTML E-Mail > - - - - - - -> X If you receive email saying "Send this to everyone you know," / \ PLEASE pretend you don't know me.
hmmm, problem with that is that if you are where I am, you must make sure to specify that is the 'end' of the address. just look at my domain....
swarf, steam and wind
-- David Forsyth -:- the email address is real /"\
formatting link
\ / ASCII Ribbon campaign against HTML E-Mail > - - - - - - -> X If you receive email saying "Send this to everyone you know," / \ PLEASE pretend you don't know me.
Agreed. For some, it *is* a DOS attack, as they can't stay logged on long enough to clean their mailbox.
Devise a solution is the more reasonable. I don't know *where* this came from originally, but my first copies were from the Netherlands (.nl domains), suggesting that it may have originated there.
One solution, which many would not care for at all, is to eliminate Windows machines from the net, as it is depending upon security holes in those machines to spread.
At a minimum, strip Outlook Express and Internet Explorer from the machines, and replace them with programs by someone else than Microsoft -- ones which worry more about being secure, instead of adding every possible bell and whistle to the system, whether it is needed or not.
One other possibility is to declare HTML to be illegal in e-mail and usenet, as at least one form of it is using HTML features to automatically infect unpatched machines.
Some ISPs are stripping out such attachments from outgoing e-mail, so I get the neutered copies here (a lot fewer than the full-strength ones which were coming in before I slammed the door on anything over 100K in size (including any possible *valid* e-mails). But to do this, you have to either run your own e-mail server (as I do), or to be able to run a program on the ISP's system under your own account to strip out anything over a certain size, or with special keywords in it, such as (using egrep patterns):
*NOTE* -- if you try sending me e-mail about this (or about anything else) with any of these strings included, your e-mail will be automatically put into the VIRII mailbox, and I may never see it.
Note that some virii come with "filename=" instead of "name=", but these patterns will catch both. It helps to separate valid e-mail from virii (including the neutered ones being passed out by some ISP's outgoing filtering -- and those seem to be all that is actually arriving here at present, thanks to my limit on acceptable filesize.
It could indeed do what spam has already been threatening -- make e-mail close to useless.
I have been running at a comfortable 60 -80 Brightmail messages a day, most of which the Netscape filter takes out.
The question I have is, why has neither Microsoft or Symantic bitched about this blatant trespassing all over their trademarks? I have seen nothing in the press on this matter.
Personally, I made the switch to Linux last week, so I don't really worry about virii showing up.
i am waiting for some serious lawsuit, christ, if there ever was a slam-dunk, this would be it.
i did not know html, per se, was a problem(?).
that seems to be the only thing i get, and few of those.
....>
the Okie court descision could be a blessing. _all_ of cable business news channels are covering this closely and asking, "what about spam, what about junk mail, why do we have to endure this....." my hope is this no call list will be a wake up to congress. --Loren
As has been pointed out in a recent security white paper, no open network is secure if it consists of a monoculture of operating systems and application programs. In other words, the near monopoly status of Windows and its application suites makes it practically impossible to to avoid cascade failures due to common vulnerabilities. This would also be true if everyone used Linux or Solaris or Mac OS.
The key to robustness on the internet, or in nature, is diversity. This makes it impossible for a virus or worm to spread so widely that it has catastrophic effects on the network. So eliminating Windows is not a sound technique. Virus and worm writers would simply turn to exploiting the vulnerabilities of the OS which replaces it (and they all have vulnerabilities because no complex program is bug free).
Instead, it should be public policy to promote diversity in OS and application software on the net. No OS or application should be allowed to approach monopoly status. Hardware diversity would be beneficial too. The near monopoly status of Intel architecture systems also leads to common vulnerabilities.
A strong open standards process (RFCs, portable data formats, etc) would insure continued interoperability without associated vulnerabilities. Note too that a strongly competitive market would tend to erase the monopoly advantages Microsoft currently enjoys, and should result in lowered prices overall. Diversity is a win-win for everyone except Microsoft.
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