In (e-mail address removed)
I recetnly installed XP - when I receive an email with an
attachment, the attachment is greyed-out and will not
open. It will also not save to a file. Do I need to
change settings to accomodate attachments?
Is this in Outlook Express? Starting with SP1, Outlook Express
does this by default, for any file type which *can* contain a
virus. It's not a virus checker, doesn't actually check the
attachments, and this doesn't mean that there actually is a virus
there.
Such attachments *are* very risky. You often see advice not to
open attachments from people you don't know. I think that that's
one of the most dangerous pieces of advice you see around,
because it implies that it's safe to do the opposite--open
attachments from friends and relatives. But many viruses spread
by sending themselves to everyone in the infected party's address
book, so attachments received from friends are perhaps the *most*
risky to open.
Personally I never open executable attachments at all, except
from a *very* few trusted sources, and then only when I'm
expecting them. But if you want to remove this safeguard, it's
easy to do so: go to Tools | Options, and on the security tab,
uncheck "Do not allow attachments..."
