spam

[Guest]

Where are all these false Microsoft Emails coming from?
And, how do I stop this. THANKS

 

[Michael Solomon \(MS-MVP Windows Shell/User\)]

They are coming from others infected with a virus. It was started by a
hacker. Once on a user's system, it searches their address book and sends
it to everyone in that address book, that's one of the main ways viruses
propagate.

Keep your antivirus software up to date and delete the e-mails. You could
try and create rules to filter it but you'll end up spending all your time
doing so.

It'll stop when this thing runs its course. You are in the same boat as a
lot of other people.

If you have a pop3 e-mail account as opposed to a web based account, you
might try the free version of Mailwasher, www.mailwasher.net. It will catch
these while they are still on the server before you've downloaded them and
you'll be able to delete them before they ever hit your inbox.

 

[davetest]

They are coming from others infected with a virus. It was started by a
hacker. Once on a user's system, it searches their address book and sends
it to everyone in that address book, that's one of the main ways viruses
propagate.

Keep your antivirus software up to date and delete the e-mails. You could
try and create rules to filter it but you'll end up spending all your time
doing so.

It'll stop when this thing runs its course. You are in the same boat as a
lot of other people.

If you have a pop3 e-mail account as opposed to a web based account, you
might try the free version of Mailwasher, www.mailwasher.net. It will catch
these while they are still on the server before you've downloaded them and
you'll be able to delete them before they ever hit your inbox.

One peculiar thing with this is that my Yahoo web-accessible account
is riddled with these messages. How can that be? There is no address
book. Yet, I receive them and apparently I'm sending them (or Yahoo
is)
Why doesn't Yahoo mail take steps to stop this. It's essentially
rendered that email account dead, cause unless I logon twice a day
and delete all the crap, it fills up and wont hold any more.

DAve

 

[JerryMouse]

One peculiar thing with this is that my Yahoo web-accessible account
is riddled with these messages. How can that be? There is no address
book. Yet, I receive them and apparently I'm sending them (or Yahoo
is)

Others, who have your name in their address book, are sending them.

Why doesn't Yahoo mail take steps to stop this. It's essentially
rendered that email account dead, cause unless I logon twice a day
and delete all the crap, it fills up and wont hold any more.

It's a mystery. What does Yahoo say when you ask them?

 

[anonymous]

Yahoo has installed a Spam button and you select the
message and press the Spam button. Easy. Look in inbox.

 

[davetest]

Yahoo has installed a Spam button and you select the
message and press the Spam button. Easy. Look in inbox.

I mark it as spam and it goes to the bulk folder.
Since the bulk folder doesn't get automatically deleted
until items have aged for 30 days AND it counts towards
the inbox size limit, there's no advantage at all.

Regarding contacting Yahoo, I've been unable,
so far, to find a contact address.
So I've got nowhere with that.

Dave

 

[Scott Tyler]

They are coming from others infected with a virus. It was started by a
hacker. Once on a user's system, it searches their address book and sends
it to everyone in that address book, that's one of the main ways viruses
propagate.

Swen.A is worse than that: In addition to the usual methods, it also
harvests email addresses directly from targeted news servers, one of which
is msnews.microsoft.com. Anyone that has posted here with a "real" email
address has gotten flooded with Swen.A.

Keep your antivirus software up to date and delete the e-mails. You could
try and create rules to filter it but you'll end up spending all your time
doing so.

It'll stop when this thing runs its course. You are in the same boat as a
lot of other people.

The only thing that's stopping Swen.A is the actions of news admins and
users: Some news admins no longer use port 119 for NNTP, some now require
usernames and passwords, others like msnews.microsoft.com greatly shortened
their retention of old messages.

At the same time, users that are aware of how Swen.A works (I learned after
reading messages on news.admin.net-abuse usenet back in August or September)
have "munged" their email addresses, so that Swen.A can't harvest them.

Others are still learning "the hard way". I see a lot of first posts from
users with real email addresses, which are quickly changed to
(e-mail address removed) with their second post.

 

[bronco7]

MICHAEL: Thanks so much. I'll try this. It makes sense
now; a friend bought a new desktop and ran the net with
no firewall or virus until she had to pay $100 to clean
her system of viruses. She had sent me several Emails.

-----Original Message-----
They are coming from others infected with a virus. It was started by a
hacker. Once on a user's system, it searches their address book and sends
it to everyone in that address book, that's one of the main ways viruses
propagate.

Keep your antivirus software up to date and delete the e- mails. You could
try and create rules to filter it but you'll end up spending all your time
doing so.

It'll stop when this thing runs its course. You are in the same boat as a
lot of other people.

If you have a pop3 e-mail account as opposed to a web based account, you
might try the free version of Mailwasher,

www.mailwasher.net. It will catch