On Saturday, February 05, 2005 at 10:29:57 PM [GMT -0500], Mary Bull wrote:
> I like to get my "ads" from Amazon. However, if they sent me an
> attachment, I would become quite wary.
Me too. The spammers know about Amazon sending ads and will send
fraudulent material. I get fraudulent stuff a lot concerning PayPal
and other banking issues.
> I would save it to my Desktop and run F-Secure, TDS-3, SpyBot and
> Trojan Remover over it, before opening it.
I'd still not assume that it's safe.
If you don't have to open the attachment, then don't open it at all.
Why would you have to? A friend or business sent it to you and
described what fun, important information is in it for you to see.
IOW's, you're expecting the attachment, it's a safe format to open,
or you're accustomed to being sent more risky formats which have been
previously ok.
> And then I would expect F-Secure to catch any "archived" mal-code that
> did try to pop up when I opened it.
They can miss things. They aren't perfect.
> I download no e-mail the address of which I don't recognize or which I
> am not expecting.
Ok. Great. However, don't forget fraudulent mail. The machine of
friends may also be compromised and malicious messages sent out
without their knowing. You'll see them as the sender.
The PayPal fraud notes are skillful. It's not until you pass the mouse
over the URL they invite you to visit that you see it's not a paypal
URL. They're taking you to a site which is likely just as fraudulent
as the message.
> I hope that I am not too naive and trusting. I don't know what further
> I can do to protect myself.
Unplug your machine, turn out the lights, lock your doors and.... ;)
It can be difficult, but I see you're doing well already. Much better
than many who are managing anyway. :)
> I do not click on any attachment that my sister who uses Outlook
> Express-HTML sends me, unless she has sent a previous mail saying what
> it is. I read her mails in plain text, also.
Ok.
> And I long ago stopped her from sending me those commercial greeting
> cards. I told her I was deleting them unopened.
:)
--
Cheers,
-= Allie =-
..... You're trying to pull a clinton, aren't you?
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