A unique science project

Thank you Baa, Garden Wife and Granny Lois for raising the only points relevant in this discussion:

1. Baa says: "Many of us do want to help when these things get into our mail box but how many of us check they are genuine?" EXACTLY the point I raised.

2. Garden Wife says: "...it sounded like a pretty simple and unimaginative thing to do for science project - not too hard, you know?" DUH! Not only that, but can someone PLEASE explain to me how sending an email chain letter even qualifies as science?

3. Granny Lois says: "Right now, DH's computer is down because of a virus he picked up somewhere... Even though we both have Norton, it apparently doesn't always work. Norton has always protected us, though, from bad emails, and I'm glad of that." Case closed.

Granny Lois, I would venture to say that Garden Wife, who is wonderfully knowledgeable about these things, might gently disagree with you that you can be absolutely certain the worm or virus did not come through an email. These bits of code are relatively small, and are frequently passed through email distribution. The only virus and worm infections my PC has ever picked up have been distributed via email.

Adam.

Hi - I see the conversation still wends its way down this brook. That's good, and it is raising some good points. Yes, I do agree about Norton; it has done well from protecting you from the viruses it caught, but no antivirus is foolproof. New viruses are introduced to the "wild" daily, and no antivirus is going to catch them all. Some execute with your merely viewing the e-mail in the preview pane of Outlook because they contain code which executes when the mail is viewed. 'Nuff said - we can't be too careful.

The only reason I replied to this kid's e-mail prior to validating it? Trust. It rang true. But I also sent it from a "junk" e-mail which I never check and which is completely inundated with spam already. I'd never use my main e-mail address for something like this -- although my main e-mail address gets its fair share of spam!

Very good reminder on the preview pane. One of the 1st basics of security is to disable this feature. If you're using outlook or OE, you can disable this by going to.....View-Layout-and uncheck the "Show Preview Pane" box. Knock on wood, but in the 9 or so years I've been on-line, I've never had a virus.

Hi -- just taking a quick peek to see if there are anymore "interesting" comments on Brooklyn. ;)

What's interesting about Brooklyn?

;~)

Adam.

My DH's side of the family is a pretty "interesting" part of Brooklyn. LOL His grandmother's have lived there for years and still only speak Italian. Yet the most wonderful, warm family oriented people you'll ever meet, and dare I even mention the FOOD!! :)

Now as to this discussion, I do agree with the word of caution - it is certainly no fun (nor is it cheap)having your computer crash because of a virus, adding to the cost of getting your computer repaired, you also can have the loss of work and disappointed clients if you base your work through your computer. Our friends have innocently passed viruses to us without even realizing. Sometimes you just got to play it extra safe.

Another note on Norton -- it is really important to get it updated regularly to have it alerted to the most current viruses out there. (Something my much more computer savvy sister taught us.)

This message was edited Thursday, Feb 20th 6:59 PM

I forgot to mention -- AVG Antivirus is excellent, and is free. It can be downloaded at Grisoft.com: http://www.grisoft.com/html/us_downl.htm

Click the "Download AVG Free Edition" link at the top and scroll down a bit, then click the button with the same text. They request you register and provide a valid e-mail so they can send you the registration code. They don't spam; the registration code helps them keep track of how many unique users they have.

Two web sitew that you can use to verify emails such as this are:

http://www.urbanlegends.com/

http://vil.nai.com/VIL/hoaxes.asp

Great point, Carla. We pointed out the problems about not verifying stuff, but not any solutions! Some others include

Snopes.com: http://snopes.com
Truthorfiction.com: http://truthorfiction.com
About.com: http://urbanlegends.about.com

If you lose those links to snopes, etc - the easiest way I have found to check the validity of such as what has been discussed here is to copy/paste a unique line segment from the email - put it in quotes on a search engine such as Google. I have been correct in my guesses about 98% of the time.

To add some humor to all of this - I recall my bath of fire and my own gullibility. Remember the one about the tourists in Florida who awoke in the bathtubs packed in ice and a note left warning them to call 911 - that their kidney had been harvested by the black market kidney thieves???? Well, even if you didn't get hit w/ that years ago - I did - and I was SO upset I sent email to ALL our local TV/radio stations asking WHY we weren't being warned............arrrrrggggghhhhhhhhh......and it was then that I got a graduate degree in the "get a clue" school!!!!!

So - I have been there, I have understood that need to help, to inform, and most of all - to believe in the generalized goodness of people. And it is that very business that keeps most of the bogus emails circulating.

I am glad that this was legitimate. I am a bit surprised that the teacher wasn't computer savy enough to know that this would NOT be a good idea, however.

Thanks for all the input from the informed membership of DG!

Vicki in Olympia

Vicki - Don't feel bad about that iced kidney story, for one of our local news crews reported it was true, then had to recant.

Then why do I have this nasty scar and a bad case of the sniffles?

Adam.

Adam, that is NOT where the kidneys are...

But he WAS immersed in a tub chock full of ice cubes...

;) There's another urban legend: That you catch cold from catching a chill. No, you get a cold from a virus!

This message was edited Sunday, Feb 23rd 7:26 PM

GW - Thank you for that!!!!! It helps me to forgive myself for egg on my face!!!

LOL

Vicki