News from ITCS: Fall Term 2007
Beware of Links in E-Mail That Spread Viruses
Have you received an e-card from "a friend" lately? Think twice before clicking the link in the message to look at the card.
There has been an increase recently in viruses and other malware that spread to your computer when you click such links in e-mail messages.
According to Bruce Burrell, leader of the Virus Busters, this malware comes in many forms and under many names. The VirusScan anti-virus software most often labels new variants Nuwar, Zhelatin, or Tibs-Packed, but the general media most often refer to all of them as the Storm Worm.
"The most common method of transmission seems to be through an e-mail message announcing an electronic postcard," said Burrell. "Click on the link, and bam, you're toast—or your computer is, anyway."
Unfortunately, because the e-mail messages themselves do not contain malware—only links pointing to it—they are difficult for the anti-virus filters on the U-M mail gateway to catch. Up-to-date anti-virus software on your computer will usually recognize and stop the malware when it attempts to install itself, but, said Bruce, "more often than we'd like, there is a window of opportunity there for the malware."
To protect your computer against this threat, the Virus Busters recommend the following:
- Have anti-virus software on your computer and keep it updated. See the Virus Busters website for details about VirusScan for Windows and Sophos for Macintosh.
- Use caution when clicking links in e-mail messages. It is safer to copy and paste a URL from a message to your web browser rather than clicking a link, in case the sender has hidden a different URL under the one listed in the message. It is even safer to type the URL into your web browser manually. If the link looks at all suspicious, don't click it.
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