Klarinet Archive - Posting 000705.txt from 1999/04

From: "Don Yungkurth" <clarinet@-----.net>
Subj: [kl] Re:New Virus (skip if you know about security)
Date: Thu, 15 Apr 1999 14:19:43 -0400

Hi Mark,

This is probably going to be long, but you suggested contacting you if
having trouble with security. First of all, we have received and opened
Happy99.exe, sent by a well-meaning friend, obviously not via "Klarinet".
I wasn't suspicious, but perhaps should have been, since this person is
even *less* knowledgeable than me about computers!

You said:

>In MS Word, turn off automatic macro execution before opening any
>document. Don't open documents or Excel spreadsheets from people you
>don't know or even if it is from a person that you _do_ know didn't
>but they didn't tell you there was an attachment.

I've searched around MS Word and haven't managed to find a way to "turn off
automatic macro execution before opening any document". Can you help me
locate this choice?

>Turn off the "Javascript clipboard copy" on all except trusted sites
>in MSIE Explorer 5. In fact, on any browser, go through the security
>options since those options will tell you what things _are_ allowed
>to run on your computer. Try & understand what they mean; if you're
>not sure, contact me privately and I'll be more than willing to lend
>a hand if I can.

Could you give me more detail as to how to do this?

>Doing those things I've outlined above will not guarantee that your
machine won't be attacked, but it >_will_ help. . . . . . . . I do run
a virus/worm checker weekly (right after updating it off the Internet via a
>site with PGP key) "just in case".

Would you explain the last sentence? What virus/worm checker? Updating
via site with PGP key? Just in case?

While trying to do what Dave Sandusky suggested in his note, I ran across
my "cookie" folder for the first time. I was appalled at the size of it.
Can I just throw things out? Should I assume that places like Amazon are
OK to keep cookies from?

I've also written to Dave Sandusky, since I was not able to do as he
suggested. I could delete the two files (ska.exe and ska.dll) but windows
wouldn't let me rename two (wsock32.dll and wsock32.ska). He stated that I
wouldn't be able to do the delete if connected to the internet. I wasn't
connected, but still couldn't do the delete. I haven't gotten a response
from him yet.

Any specific or general advice would be appreciated. So far, I haven't
noticed any particular problems with the PC, but I have the sense that some
things aren't happening as fast as they used to. Dave indicated that some
things will not happen until you do a start on Windows. I haven't done a
start in quite a while - perhaps since before we opened Happy99 - since
I've been leaving the PC on all the time.

Regards,

Don

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