getting weird e-mails

I have gotten 2 weird e-mails the last few days. I did not open the attachments & trashed them. (I didn't open the 2nd one at all & just trashed it). The 1st one came from a DG member, I e-mailed them back to ask what frames in e-mail was before I opened it, their reply was I didn't send it. I am not very computer savvy, so I hope this will help: I have erased all DG members from my address book. I will not be sending anyone an e-mail for a while, I have no trades going on right now. I have finished the daylily co-op & will not be sending anymore e-mail for that. (Except, Elena I replied to your e-mail this morning). If I do need to send someone an e-mail I will post about it 1st. I just don't want anyone to have to mess with this because of me. So I will just stay quiet for a while.

FYI: the 1st e-mail message was from a DG member with the subject line of "How are you"

The 2nd e-mail was from "asdf" with a subject line of "Eager to see you"

maybe I am over reacting but as I said earlier, I am not very computer savvy.

If you need to e-mail me for anything (letting me know your daylilies arrived, etc.) be specific on the subject line, or better yet, please post on the daylily co-op page.

Thanks,
Julie

I am so glad you brought it up. I am getting them too. Only a few were from DG, the rest are from other unknown people/places. Most of them are coming through stripped clean and blank, but several have quite perverse subject titles and such. My ISP must be cleaning them because there are no warnings on my virus protection. Two people have tried to break through my firewall too. Thank heavens my hubby has our system blocked. When he tried to ping the IP addys they came from, those were also blocked. Lots of weirdos out there with nothing better to do I guess and those fools have protection for their systems!!!

= virus/worm or trojan at work. update asap

Mark

I'm thinking someone who doesn't like DG set up an account on DG and decided to email some of it's members "just for fun" and maybe a little mischief. Just my opinion. It would make sense too, if it came from a DG member, but not a member you're familiar with. Hmmm...maybe it's someone from over at one of those "other" garden forum sites?...lol We all know, or at least I do, how mean-spirited "they" can be...trashing you behind your back (yes, I have had that happen to me...someone sent me the email that was sent to her from the guy that runs one of those other sites). Maybe I'm being paranoid, but I wouldn't put it past them. ;) If I were Dave (and this is totally my thoughts only), I would set up a little targeted IP blocking. A little investigation into the activity of the offending "members" of DG should reveal who's responsible and where they are coming from/originating from...I would think. Of course, we can't expect Dave to respond publicly to all of this other than to assure you're security is being taken care of, so don't think that just because Dave doesn't chime in every time something like this happens that he's not paying attention. I'm sure he is. Whoever it is, this isn't rare. It's not common though...I wouldn't expect someone to target you personally...that's a little odd. Usually this kind of thing is more generic and widespread. Yet another reason I never use my home email address for anything I'm registered for on the net. I'd suggest you all get a free Yahoo, Netscape, Hotmail or other free email account...not related to your internet service provider at home. If nothing else, you can always delete that free account if you get a bunch of hassles and nobody will ever be able to contact you again...you can just laugh, knowing that the idiots will be spamming a non-existent mailbox...lol, unless you start spreading your new email address around again. At least you wouldn't be getting that garbage at home. Kinda like getting a new phone number. Don't give the idiots a chance to bug you folks, just get yourself a free account and delete it if you get a bunch of junk...then open a new account :) If nothing else, you can always take the email address of the person emailing you with garbage and sign them up for some of their own junk mail...lol...of course, you know I'd never do that because it's wrong ;) ...wink, wink.

This person may not know they have a virus and the virus automatically emails from your address book...I had it awhile back and someone I had not emailed for months emailed me and told me I had one and I argued with them saying they were wrong so I checked it out and I did have the trojan virus!

It was easy to remove!

You should email these people to tell them!

Good Luck!

It's not a DG member 'per se', it's a very nasty virus that is propagating itself via softwood cutting, I mean, sending itself to everyone in the affected computer's address book.

Another reason not to use stupid Microsoft software.

dave

I guess we need to clarify whether or not this person sent the emails using the email function on the member page for each DG member. If that's how the emails were sent, it wasn't a virus that did it...because the email client (outlook express for example) on your machine is what sends the mail when you have a virus...the email function on the member page of DG isn't a function of your email client...that's something that Dave is providing. So that's why I think someone manually went to the member page for the DG member in question and sent a message. That's all I can assume though, from the description of the problem.

Did the email in question contain the blurb about "A NOTE FROM DAVE'S GARDEN:
>
> This E-mail was sent to you via the Dave's Garden website. To protect
your
> privacy, the sender has never been given your E-mail address. Your E-mail
> address is kept secret from all visitors. The only way they can reach you
> is through this method.
>
> If you wish to reveal yourself to this sender, then feel free to respond.
> If you do not wish to reveal yourself to this sender, then ignore this
> E-mail
> and they will never know who you are.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
---
>
> The sender's username on Dave's Garden is (insert member name here)

If so...I think the person went to the member page and sent the message, not using their email client on their own PC. I guess we need a more detailed explanation of HOW the message came to the people that got it.

This message was edited Tuesday, Apr 30th 1:48 PM

I had a really strange one yesterday....but, now that
I'm back on the Internet
Device....they can't hut me
at this point. Sicko people ine
the world....some can really fool ya!!

"eyes"

hczone: I don't allow images or any other attachments through the membermail system, so it is literally an impossibility that a virus be transmitted via the DG mail system.

Let me repeat that.

It is literally an impossibility that a virus be transmitted via the DG mail system.

I have to remind people of this every single time a new virus comes out. First people wonder if it's a security problem with DG. Then I explain what's going on. Then someone steps forward with evidence that it was not sent via DG. Then things quiet down and we start again.

It is literally an impossibility that a virus be transmitted via the DG mail system. I have programmed it very carefully. I would challenge anyone to break the system and actually get a virus through here - "it ain't gonna happen".

Rest assured that the virus anyone receives (and I've personally received over 100 copies of it already) are coming from people who are using Microsoft Outlook and you are in the unfortunate position of being an entry in their address book. Nothing more, nothing less.

Dave

Oh, so she got an attachment?....I guess I totally skipped over that part...so you're right. I guess I missed that...lol Nothing like a good conspiracy theory though :)

Just read the original post again and knowing all that...oops!...it's obvious now that it was a virus-generated message...and NOT thru DG. I think I've had a few of those myself with that subject line...but not for awhile.

I wasn't saying it came thru the DG site...not with an attachment anyway. I was going on the assumption that a person could or would have sent a plain text message sent via the DG email function on the member's home page. That's all I meant. I know they can't send attachments thru DG...don't count me in as someone that believes you can...I'm a little more schooled than that when it comes to computers/email/internet. I was just thinking she got a plain ole text message. I don't know how I skipped right over or ignored the attachment part...lol

Sorry for the confusion...that 12 lashes with a wet noodle for me!

This message was edited Tuesday, Apr 30th 1:56 PM

I never ever blame the person they come from. Compost happens. I do email them back to see if they had tried to send me something. Even when I know the person sending something, I don't open it unless I am expecting something and if I am not, I do write to ask if they sent something. Being married to a techie sure helps cut down on the amount of stuff that does get through. :)

12 lashes coming right up, hzcone. ;-)

That's a good procedure to follow Badseed. Now if I could just get my dad to quit spamming me with everything he gets!...lol I swear he sends along every email he gets...and he's sure I'll be soooo interested in it :)

I think most of you know that I having been getting some horrid things through the mail and then this morning I had another with 'eager to see you' also. Hubbie sorted it!!

thanks all, I am not blaming Daves Garden or the person it came from. She wrote back that she didn't send it. She didn't know what the frames were either. Should I e-mail her & tell her she might have a virus? I think I will. That hasn't came up in our correspondence.

OK, if I didn't open the attatchments, does that mean I (my computer) is OK?

I don't use the Outlook Express, I use a HotMail address (thru MSN ISP)

I did have my e-mail address posted on a thread, and have since removed it. I think I'll change my DG e-mail address to my yahoo for a while also.

thanks, Julie

Julie - I think that only Outlook users are affected by the virus (but I could be wrong).

OK, now to show my true stupidity.(LOL) I have Microsoft Outlook, I just don't use it, never have. So whatever that means!

By the way, the person's name who was used to send the questionable e-mail, did a virus scan on their computer and came up clean.

My inbox was OK this morning - no new weird e-mails!

Thank you all for helping me through my scare! I have more than likely over reacted. Maybe I should try to learn more about my computer system so I don't panic in the future.

Dingbloom...the person who sent the email to you is the person who is most likely infected or was infected. You don't have to use Outlook to RECEIVE the message. The person who gets infected is the one who sends out the email (without knowing) to everyone in their address book usually. So it's not on your end...you only recieved the message.
I'm not sure about the scan coming up clean. There are several things that play into that. Does he/she have the virus scanner up to date for the latest viruses?, etc, etc. Who knows. As long as you just delete it, don't worry about it...you're ok :)

HI I have been getting them also, BLANK Messages. I have updated my virus scanner and scanned my drives and found nothing so I believe they are coming from a persons machine that has the worms on it. I haven;t gotten any from Dave members yet but I have gotten them from other people I know.
tamlamb

I'm getting a lot this week, none from names I recognize, but they are all about 120k. 121, 124, numbers right around there. And they don't show that an attachment is there. I'm deleting them right out. I use Pegasus, but still hope that I don't get one and pass it on.
If you are a DGer and want to write to someone without going through Dave's, we might ought to start putting our DG name in the subject line. just another thought.

WORMS!? you say Tamlamb?...I wonder if you put some Sevin on the PC...I wonder if that would kill the worms and fix the email problem? lol ;) Just make sure it's not under warranty if you decide to dust it with Sevin, because I doubt Dell or Gateway or whoever will honor your warranty if they find Sevin all over your PC...lol

I got one this morning from a Web-TV address. I did know the person so wrote and told them. I've had several come up this week also. Most of mine have been W32.Klez.gen@mm and it is a virus. Had a couple of them with worms also. I wonder why all of a sudden this is happening? I haven't had any for months and now they are coming in every day. Even that SnowWhite HaHaHa has been coming again.

I suppose it just goes in cycles...depending on how many people get infected...it just keeps going around.

hgzone6: The sender of your infected message would not find a virus when they scanned if the computer did not recognize it as a virus. If the viral defintions had not been kept current, the scan is useless. I had a similar problem, and my scan results were clean. When I went back online and downloaded the new definitions from Norton, the offending file was immediately grabbed and quaranteened.

It's a tough call when you are dealing with these nasty little buggers. It's easy to feel resentment and blame for the one who sent you the virus, but it is certainly not intentional, and often the sender has no idea it has even happened. The limit of their guilt is not protecting their own systems against infection, and even that is often not 100 percent foolproof.

We've gotten in the habit of deleting all forwards without personal messages, and we do not open any attachments from unknown or unreliable sources. We keep our Norton updated and always download new viral definitions when we are notified of their availability. We keep our Norton subscription current at all times.

We are, however, users of Outlook Express, and I'm sure many others here in the Garden are, as well. I'm beginning to think it is time to change. I like some of the bells and whistles I have with Outlook, but it's also a sitting duck for infection.

My Norton scans all messages going out and coming in, and it's current, so I hope I won't be a problem to anyone here in the garden. If I receive any suspicious mail, I'll let the sender know.

HZ, thanks, I feel much better about it all today. Sorry I panicked! By the way - I like the Sevin idea!

I do not hold blame to the person it came from at all. I know it was not her fault.

Thanks all!

To further muddy the waters, let me tell you something really fun. The persons who appear to have sent the viruses may truly NOT have sent them.

This latest rash of viruses does two things which make them particularly nasty:

One: I know of at least one (W32.klez.gen@mm) which randomly grabs an e-mail address from the victim's addressbook and puts it in the FROM field of the e-mail, making it appear to be coming from that e-mail address, even when it's NOT.

This explains why sometimes they come from people you know, as well as why they sometimes come from an address you've never seen in your life. It's the luck of the draw.

And B: Some forms of these viruses use their OWN e-mail client to send the messages, not even using Outlook or Eudora to do their dirty work. The program just lies in wait until you are online, then sends it in the background.

So...If someone says s/he didn't send the e-mail, it's entirely possible s/he didn't. I learned that this week when a I got an infected attachment/e-mail from a friend at church; when I wrote to him about it, he called and said he was totally up-to-date with Norton AV. Norton is what caught the virus as it downloaded with my e-mail, so I knew something was up.

A quick look at the full headers of the e-mail showed that the originating IP address was not associated with the "sender's" e-mail account at all. In other words, the virus forged the headers.

How's that for a clever cleaver? *sigh*

If you use LookOut or LookOut Express, make sure you have the preview mode OFF. Many of these scripts will execute even when the message is just previewed and not even read. And, of course, don't open attachments unless you're 100% sure the sender meant to send them, that your antivirus is a current version and updated (that day, even) and that you're darned sure about what you're getting into.

One other safeguard is to make sure you have Windows set up to show ALL file extensions (to do this, look in your help files). That way, you won't accidently open a file which appears to be called, say,

kittycat.jpg
a simple image which is safe to open

kittycat.jpg.exe
a program which will run when clicked

Oh well...I just deleted two emails...one from "nancie" and the subject lines was "0.576 gzip". Never heard of either. Another w/subject line "eager to see you" (as mentioned above). Guess these badboys are still floating around. Also guess I better set my Windows to open file extensions like guru-gardenwifemahatma says. So thanks!!! ô¿ô