Virus Warning

[Susan Cox]

About the virus,

I received a note from Craig (not Craig's fault) a week ago or so and
along with it came a second email with a file attached.  I soon to
discovered that it was a MTX virus.  I don't remember the subject line,
but there was a download on the second note that gave me the impression
that it was a Screen Saver which had a file name something like
'ScreenSaver.exe'.  I clicked on it thinking that it MUST be a really
neat Aroid screen saver and that Craig had intentionally sent it.  Don't
do this.  The way this virus works is to send out information every 2
seconds or so as long as the computer is on the internet.   It must grab
file names from wherever and send a download within a second email when
another email is sent out intentionally.  Mine was sending out a
'shortcut to MSDOS.EXE' file.  I soon discovered that it was not
possible to get rid of the virus without Norton Antivirus.  I tried
using McAfee, which identified 76 infected files on my computer, but
couldn't get rid of 6 .exe files.  They couldn't be deleted by me nor
quarantined by McAfee.  I was afraid that I was going to have to
reformat (which another person whom I exchange email with ended up
having to do.  Theirs had over 200 files infected).  I called a local
computer store to ask about Norton and they said Norton could wipe it
out.  They were right as far as I know.  They did the task for me and I
don't think they did a reformat.  I believe that McAfee can keep your
computer from contracting the virus, but it couldn't get rid of it once
it was already there.  This is a bad virus that causes minor error
messages at first, then starts causing things like the inability to
recognize the floppy drive.  Eventually, it couldn't boot.  I was down
to no computer when I took it in for virus protection.  Once you have
virus protection, you need to leave it running at all times in the
background where it will check for viruses as your email comes in.
There are updated virus definitions that need to be downloaded on a
regular basis which come free for 3 months with Norton (after that,
$3.00 a month for the definitions) and a year's worth with McAfee.  In
case anyone would like to know, the Norton program uses 21MBs of memory,
whereas McAfee uses more like 9.  I don't know what difference it makes
as far as the performance in protection goes, but Norton is using up
what's left of my memory and so much RAM to run in the background that
my computer brings pages up piece by piece as I watch.  Some people just
don't have anything better to do than to ruin other people's fun.  It's
a shame.   Bonaventure, I sent an email to you that your computer
recognized as carrying this virus and it sent back an email informing me
that mine had an MTX virus.  My computer is now clean, but it was a
nightmare and it took a week to figure it out and get it fixed.  Anyone
receiving a second email from another person which has only a download
on it, don't open it.  Delete it immediately and run a complete virus
scan on your computer's files, every one.  There was one small
indication that something was different about Craig's second email.  The
letter  's'  was missing from his display name which is usually 'craigs'
I believe.  I noticed it, but didn't give it further thought.  I
received a second email from Craig that had another trailing email with
an entirely different file attached to it, but I don't recall it's file
name.  Craig, you have the MTX virus in case you were still wondering.
There's no telling if you sent the virus to me, or if I already had it.
It's rampant in Canada, CA, AZ, TX and Florida, at least.  If I
understood it right, that's what I gathered from a map at the McAfee
site.

Here's to Norton and McAfee, to Aroids, and to Spring!
Susan Cox
August wasn't exactly warm, it's been raining..sundown or not, I don't
see limits on show (and it's slushy on the hillsides).....where are
Camelot's rules when you need them?