here is what
[email protected] wrote back to me:
blah, blah, blah, don't open any e mails with attachments!
Recently, there have been reports of theW32.Beagle.J@mm/W32/Bagle.j@mm
worm virus spreading quickly across email networks. Typical of worms,
the W32.Beagle.J@mm worm propagates itself by sending a mass email with
an infected attachment to email addresses found in an infected
computer's files (e.g., address books, text files, etc.).
Infected attachments may come in the form of the following files: .zip
or .pif. The .zip file contains a password-protected .exe file with
the
5-digit password mentioned in the email. In addition, the email that is
sent out by the worm will contain a forged email address in the "From:"
field of the email header beginning with one of the following:
management@, administration@, staff@, noreply@, or support@.
Therefore,
email users may receive an infected message and it may appear to have
come from a familiar domain, when in fact, it came from a totally
different source. (Note: The forging of the email header may also
result
in users receiving "Failure Delivery" messages for messages they never
sent out. If you receive such a message, we encourage you to just
delete
it.)
In addition, the body of the message will contain a message indicating
that your account has been disabled, warn you about attacks on your
e-mail account, inform you that a large amount of viruses have been
detected coming from your email account, or that complaints about spam
from your email account have been reported. It will also state that
more
information is available when you open the attached file. Please do not
download or open the attached file.
For more information on this particular worm, you may visit:
http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/pf/
[email protected]
It is important to note that Yahoo! Mail is a web-based email system.
Your email messages, address book, and other account information are
stored on Yahoo!'s servers, rather than on your computer. Because most
viruses and worms infect your local computer, it is very unlikely that
this worm would propagate through a Yahoo! Mail account. Furthermore,
simply viewing your email messages in Yahoo! Mail does not make your
computer vulnerable to the worm. Attachments sent along with emails are
not a threat to your system if you do not download or open them.
However, if you choose to download or open an email attachment, your
computer does become vulnerable to computer viruses and worms. The same
is true of all files you download to your computer, whether email
attachments or not.
Always keep in mind that there is a risk involved whenever downloading
email attachments to your computer or sending email attachments to
others. As stated in the Yahoo! Terms of Service, neither Yahoo! nor
its
licensors are responsible for any damages caused by your decision to do
so. The Yahoo! Mail Abuse team recommends that you never download files
from an unknown source.
As a general rule, we recommend that you always choose to scan email
attachments for viruses before downloading them, even if the sender may
be familiar to you. Following these suggestions will greatly reduce
your
likelihood of experiencing trouble from computer viruses and worms.
If you believe you have a virus or worm on your system, we recommend
that you run an anti-virus program with the latest updates. You may
also
choose to contact your computer's user support group for assistance.