public service announcement
Nov. 21st, 2004 05:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
buggeryHmm.
I don't advertise this*, but I use the forwarding service LiveJournal offers to its paid members; e-mail addressed to [journal name] [at] livejournal.com gets forwarded to the address specified by the journal owner if they've chosen to use the service.
In the last twelve hours, I've received two e-mails ostensibly from another LJ user, apparently sent from her @livejournal.com address (which itself is suspect, as the @lj addresses are forward-only, not web-mail), with the subject lines "Re: Thanks :)" and "Re: Thank you!" Both contained attachments or inline links to a download my computer identified as a program. (The mail program I use, when I use e-mail at all, displays anything except text as an attachment, even forwarded e-mails; my browser is set up to ask me before it allows anything to download.)
I haven't downloaded either of them, but I'm sure they're something nasty, doubtless viral.
Now, the LJ user the mails appear to have come from is nobody I know, but she appears to have a perfectly legitimate fannish journal, so I'm going to presume that whoever picked my username (and guessed correctly that I use the forwarding -- like I said, I don't advertise that fact) got hers the same way, and that she probably has no idea that virii are being sent in her name. Heck, for all I know some stranger elsewhere in LJ-land may be getting virus-laden mails with my name on them.
On the sadly good chance, however, that somebody reading this will receive similar mail, and:
+ will blame the apparent sender; or
+ will be operating without a firewall installed; or
+ will use an e-mail program that displays attachments inline; or
+ will use an e-mail or browser program that allows downloads without content warnings; or
+ will just go ahead and open the damned thing, because they have to see what it is;
This is your warning. Hazardous materials. Avoid contact.
*One more time: I do not advertise the fact that I can be reached via LJ-mail, or e-mail of any kind... because I strongly prefer not to be reached that way at all. If you take advantage of the fact that I've now owned up to my LJ-mail being set to forward to an account I check, however sporadically (not much point when you don't expect mail to arrive in it), I will be very unhappy with you. If you have something to say, please take advantage of the comment feature on one of my posts. That's why I have a livejournal.
I don't advertise this*, but I use the forwarding service LiveJournal offers to its paid members; e-mail addressed to [journal name] [at] livejournal.com gets forwarded to the address specified by the journal owner if they've chosen to use the service.
In the last twelve hours, I've received two e-mails ostensibly from another LJ user, apparently sent from her @livejournal.com address (which itself is suspect, as the @lj addresses are forward-only, not web-mail), with the subject lines "Re: Thanks :)" and "Re: Thank you!" Both contained attachments or inline links to a download my computer identified as a program. (The mail program I use, when I use e-mail at all, displays anything except text as an attachment, even forwarded e-mails; my browser is set up to ask me before it allows anything to download.)
I haven't downloaded either of them, but I'm sure they're something nasty, doubtless viral.
Now, the LJ user the mails appear to have come from is nobody I know, but she appears to have a perfectly legitimate fannish journal, so I'm going to presume that whoever picked my username (and guessed correctly that I use the forwarding -- like I said, I don't advertise that fact) got hers the same way, and that she probably has no idea that virii are being sent in her name. Heck, for all I know some stranger elsewhere in LJ-land may be getting virus-laden mails with my name on them.
On the sadly good chance, however, that somebody reading this will receive similar mail, and:
+ will blame the apparent sender; or
+ will be operating without a firewall installed; or
+ will use an e-mail program that displays attachments inline; or
+ will use an e-mail or browser program that allows downloads without content warnings; or
+ will just go ahead and open the damned thing, because they have to see what it is;
This is your warning. Hazardous materials. Avoid contact.
*One more time: I do not advertise the fact that I can be reached via LJ-mail, or e-mail of any kind... because I strongly prefer not to be reached that way at all. If you take advantage of the fact that I've now owned up to my LJ-mail being set to forward to an account I check, however sporadically (not much point when you don't expect mail to arrive in it), I will be very unhappy with you. If you have something to say, please take advantage of the comment feature on one of my posts. That's why I have a livejournal.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2004-11-21 04:04 pm (UTC)AV info is here: http://us.mcafee.com/virusInfo/default.asp?id=description&virus_k=129631
no subject
Date: 2004-11-21 04:58 pm (UTC)