Subject: AUDITORY: Virus incident From: Dan Ellis <dpwe(at)EE.COLUMBIA.EDU> Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2000 12:05:38 -0500Dear List - As you will have noticed, it appears that one of our number was struck by a variant of the infamous LOVEBUG virus, with the effect that the virus was sent to the entire AUDTIORY list earlier this morning. I'm pleased to note that about 30 sites rejected the message outright via filtering software in their mail gateways. I'm hoping that the remainder of readers were either immune (because, like me, they don't read their mail with Microsoft Outlook), or had installed protection after the original LOVEBUG outbreak. The message to avoid is: Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2000 22:23:54 -0800 From: jhershey(at)COGSCI.UCSD.EDU Attachment: LOQUSUPI.BMP.vbs It's that vbs (Visual Basic Script?) attachment that's the real culprit. Unfortunately, being a non-Windows person, I don't understand very much about this virus, but I believe it automatically forwards itself to everyone on your personal email alias list. The follow-up message sent to AUDITORY contains some good advice. I have also been pointed to the following web sites: http://www.fsecure.com/v-descs/love.htm http://www.antivirus.com/vinfo/virusencyclo/default5.asp?VName=VBS_LOVELETTER http://vil.nai.com/villib/dispVirus.asp?virus_k=98617 My understanding is that you are not in danger unless you are reading your mail with a version of Microsoft Outlook AND you haven't made modifications to disable the automatic execution of VBS scripts. My deepest regrets for this situation. There's not much we can do short of installing commercial virus scans in the listserv itself, which would probably be quite a technical challenge. However, I am hopeful this won't recur or become a significant problem. -- DAn Ellis <dpwe(at)ee.columbia.edu> http://www.ee.columbia.edu/~dpwe/ Dept. of Elec. Eng., Columbia University, New York NY 10027 (212) 854-8928