Outlook Express Virus?

[Steve M]

Please excuse if this has been posted previously. I did browse this
NG but didn't find anything relevant.

My brother called me 02/01/04 with a problem he was having with his OE
mail. It was sending the same message over and over. When he would
send a new email it would send those 2 over and over. When he sent a
third one it would send 3 over and over. He called Earthlink Support
who told him the problem was in the way he had his Webmail forwarding
options set up. It took us 45 minutes to convince him it wasn't being
forwarded. The tech finally said he had a virus, reformat the drive
and reinstall XP (canned respsonse I'm sure).

Reading the description of the doom virus does not mention the
repetitive sending of emails, does anyone recognize these symptoms or
can offer a solution?

Thanks in advance.

 

[Michael Hobbs]

Personally I don't believe in reinstalling Windows unless it is cold, to a
formatted drive. So I guess I agree with the Earthlink Tech at that point.
And, that can be an answer, except what about backed up files that are
restored, how clean are they?

If this were my computer, running XP or XP-Pro, I would:
Go go Control Panel/System/System Restore. I would check the box that says
"turn off System Restore.
I would install and run Norton Antivirus and update it if it was not already
there.
Then reboot the computer pressing the ..... F8 key, I believe, starting the
machine in Safe Mode.
Run NAV from Safe Mode, following whatever instructions were presented on
anything that was found.

I would download from the Net- Spybot AND Adaware, updating both with
current files and run them. Deleting all the crap that those programs
doubtless will find.

Later, I would, and this is less important: Go into outlook express
Tools/options and click shut Off recieving or sending email as HTML format.

Now we shall see what others in here have to say! I read this group a couple
times a day. Welcome and come back.

 

[Michael Hobbs]

Oh yes, one more thing:------ Make sure his XP is updated to the hilt, and
current.
That is one of the most important things he can do.

 

[kurt wismer]

Please excuse if this has been posted previously. I did browse this
NG but didn't find anything relevant.

My brother called me 02/01/04 with a problem he was having with his OE
mail. It was sending the same message over and over. When he would
send a new email it would send those 2 over and over. When he sent a
third one it would send 3 over and over. He called Earthlink Support
who told him the problem was in the way he had his Webmail forwarding
options set up. It took us 45 minutes to convince him it wasn't being
forwarded. The tech finally said he had a virus, reformat the drive
and reinstall XP (canned respsonse I'm sure).

Reading the description of the doom virus does not mention the
repetitive sending of emails, does anyone recognize these symptoms or
can offer a solution?

what you describe does not sound like a virus... it does in fact sound
like some sort of configuration problem or program error...

and i think if had someone arguing with me for 45 minutes about what
the cause of their problem was i'd probably be tempted tell them to
rebuild their system from scratch too...

that said, if you think you have a virus, scan your drive... if you
think you have a virus your anti-virus can't detect, try a different
one or send a sample suspect file to your av developer...

 

[Steve M]

The tech finally agreed it WASN'T in any configuration setting when we
convinced him to accept an email from my brother. He was thinking my
brother was sending an email to himself and would NOT be convinced
otherwise. We were not agruing with him, only asking WHY he was
thinking it was his setting(s) in his Webmail? He would not give us a
reasonable explanation as to why a setting would cause a email to be
sent repeatably.

I just talked my brother. He has now begun the reformat of his HD so
any identification of any virus is a mute point. I was just asking if
anyone had heard of these symptoms regarding OE and probably should
not have mentioned the 45 delay with Earthlink. Sorry.

 

[kurt wismer]

Steve M wrote:
[correcting malformed usenet article]

The tech finally agreed it WASN'T in any configuration setting when we
convinced him to accept an email from my brother. He was thinking my
brother was sending an email to himself and would NOT be convinced
otherwise. We were not agruing with him, only asking WHY he was
thinking it was his setting(s) in his Webmail? He would not give us a
reasonable explanation as to why a setting would cause a email to be
sent repeatably.

i still think it was a configuration problem (perhaps not in the web
mail) or program error...

the only reason i can see the email being sent repeatedly is if it
isn't being removed from the outbox after it's sent...

I just talked my brother. He has now begun the reformat of his HD so
any identification of any virus is a mute point. I was just asking if
anyone had heard of these symptoms regarding OE and probably should
not have mentioned the 45 delay with Earthlink. Sorry.

it's generally not possible to diagnose virus problems from symptoms
anyways - anti-virus software is really the only reasonable way to go
about it for most people...