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Navy personnel at the base in Groton spend a lot of time on the internet. This morning though they were all offline for about three hours. They had to wait for protection against a nasty computer virus!
Len Schunemeyer, System Administrator:
"It generates so much e-mail traffic, that for smaller, less-robust servers, it shuts them down." The culprit is a virus called Melissa, which certainly looks innocent enough. But Melissa has been sneaking into offices around the world knocking down important computer systems. Here's how it works: The virus spreads when a computer-user opens an infected Microsoft Word document, most often called list.doc. When that happens, it's automatically sent to the first 50 people on the user's mailing list, if the user also uses Microsoft Outlook for their e-mail. It travels quickly because the e-mail appears to come from someone the user knows. It says you've got 'An important message' and "Here is that document you asked for ... don’t show anyone else ;-)", ironically followed by a happy face. Ira Winkler, Internet Security Group: "This one from a technical standpoint, isn't dangerous in and of itself, what makes it dangerous is it can spread very very quickly and fill up mail servers causing those servers to crash." It's already happened to hundreds of companies large and small. And it has placed other organizations on high-alert. Like the Navy, many companies are scrambling to update their anti-virus software so that infected e-mail gets caught. Gil Ward, Chief Information Officer: "The fact that it attaches to the first 50 addressees in your mailbox, and a snowball effect can start across the network, that alarmed us." A few words of advice from the experts: To fight Melissa they recommend installing anti-virus software in your computer. If you already have that update the software so it works for Melissa, and the simplest advice of all delete any of the "infected" e-mail before you open it. ©1999 WTNH/WTNH-DT |
Computer Users Wary of Melissa