Author: Jeroen van Dorp
Date: 09:18:54 05/16/02
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It is possible to get an idea where the message came from, but never the actual end user. I always advice people next to using virus scanner and firewall also to use a spamkilling program if using Outlook (Express). Myself I use Spamkiller, but there are freeware alternatives around. With a program like spamkiller you can check beforehand what you will download with your html-based mail program. If the title is dubious, if the sender is unknown, wipe it off the mailserver. Sometimes that goes wrong - bad luck for the other. With Spamkiller I can also set these kinds of messages to be deleted automatically, so that I actually never see them. But returning to the above: if Spamkiller receives an infected or unwanted mail -it won't affect your system, as it's text based - you can check the origin with a whois (domain lookup), reply with an error message (so the originator receives a message that your email address doesn't exists) or to the abuse address of the provider - and filter on very specific details in the message header, based on the used character set (e.g. Korean, from companies who are very agressive spammers) etc. etc. A last reminder: 99.9% of all viruses you will receive come from people having the faintest notion that their PC has been compromised. The chance that the originator of the message containing the virus is the "evil one" is practically zilch. Maybe one day you will become the staring point of a worldwide spreading of a new virus, but statistically that chance is nearly zero. <pfhew> J.
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