Subject: Your internet access is going to get suspended
I have a client who has been getting this email for the last couple of days.
Subject: Your internet access is going to get suspended
Your internet access is going to get suspended
The Internet Service Provider Consorcium was made to protect the rights of
software authors, artists.
We conduct regular wiretapping on our networks, to monitor criminal acts.
We are aware of your illegal activities on the internet wich were
originating from
You can check the report of your activities in the past 6 month that we have
attached. We strongly advise you to stop your activities regarding the
illegal downloading of copyrighted material of your internet access will be
suspended.
Sincerely
ICS Monitoring Team
At first, I was a bit freaked out, because they do do alot of downloading. I tried forewarding the email to me, but it was not delevired. When I got back there today, I had a better look at it.
It turns out to be a virus.
The message contains a zip file named user-EA49943X-activities.zip and after extracting the file is user-EA49943X-activities.exe. File names can be different with each email.
The malware registers a Winlogon notification package so that the installed module is loaded into the address space of winlogon.exe. The files cabpck.dll (known as theMal/TinyDL-T by Sophos), k86.bin and krnlcab.sys (known as the Backdoor:Win32/Haxdoor by Microsoft)) are created in the %System% folder.
A directory %Temp%\msi_setup will be created and a new connection with some host is made: http://****-****.biz/jerken/data.php?trac kid=706172616D3D6 or http://*****.net/22/data.php?trackid=7061 72616D3D636D64266C616E6
so when you get an email with this in the subject: Your internet access is going to get suspended, Delete it.
Don’t take any chances.
If its too late, check this out, and maybe it will help you solve the problem: http://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=38620.0
Mozilla Launches Ubiquity
I got this email in my inbox today, and thought I just have to share it:
Mozilla just ensured I won’t use IE8 because it released Ubiquity. What is it? It’s a box that lets you ask different questions and get answers. It’s sort of like search. But far more powerful.
It’s not for non-passionate Internet users. They won’t get it. It takes some time to learn how to use this feature. (To get what I’m talking about when I use the term “passionate” you should see my previous rant about passionates vs. non-passionates).
To really learn about how to use Ubiquity you need to:
1. Watch the video.
2. Read the instruction manual.How many “non-passionates” will do either of these?
But for someone who is radically passionate about the Internet this is a feature that’ll keep us all using Firefox and will deepen the divide. I was talking with a group of journalists from USA Today and Business Week here in Berlin and they admit that most of their readers are on Internet Explorer. One told me that his family members didn’t know why they should use Firefox and don’t care to learn about it. They’ll just stick with the defaults on their computer and not question them.
I doubt I’ll show this feature to too many “non-passionate” people. It’s too hard to explain.
But when I get to a group of people who want to more productively use the Internet? You bet!
Oh, and Microsoft, you could easily do something similar and not just for Internet Explorer, either. Look into ActiveWords. Hook that up to Web services and you could have the same thing.
Why hasn’t Microsoft purchased ActiveWords? For the same reason they won’t do something like Ubiquity in IE8. Microsoft doesn’t really care about the passionates anymore and cares more about the people who read USA Today.
Oh, Over on FriendFeed they are talking about Ubiquity.
Ubiquity is also at the top of TechMeme, which shows that passionates are the ones who still control that tech blogging site..
Sounds really interesting, I’m going to give it a go. I quite like the name Ubiquity, Its got a ring to it
Robert
Emails: what, why and where?
What are emails? I’m sure most of you know. Electronic Mail. Messages that are sent over the internet to a Email address.
Why would you need an email address? Simple, it makes life easier. Once you have an email address you can send and receive mail instantly. Stay updated with the world, and a whole bunch of other bonuses.
Where? There are so many free email services out there that its almost hard to choose from. You need to have a look at what storage space you have with those email providers. What kind of spam filtering do they have? Is it fast, reliable, user friendly and so on.
I for one, use Gmail.com. I find their interface easy to use, works well and never goes down. It has basically unlimited storage, and the list goes on.
Then you get:
Hotmail
AIM mail
Yahoo mail
Bluebottle
inbox.com
Just about every company in the world today have email addresses. They are normally Name @company .com. thats all great. but you will, most probably, want/need an email address for yourself.
With all mail, you can have it sothat the emails can be displayed on the internet with any computer through a browser. or you can have it set up to download the messages for you to an email client such as Microsoft outlook.
The way emails work:
When you send an email, it does not go directly to that person. there are a few steps involved. Like sending a normal letter. The letter goes from you to the post office, from there it gets sorted and then leaves to go to the recipients post box. Then the recipient needs to go out and fetch the mail sothat he can read it. The same with emails.
when you send and email from your machine, it first goes through what they call a SMTP server. (simple mail transfer protocol) That is used when sending an email. After the SMTP server receives the messages, it then does a quick search to find out where the messages need to go. Once it has found it, it sends the messages to the server on the other side. From there, the recipient needs to “fetch” his mail. Then his outlook client, (or any other) goes out and fetches the messages from its server using POP3 (Post Office Protocol 3)
*note: the SMTP server and the POP3 server can be the same server.
Once the person has received the message he opens it an reads what you have to say to him.
All of this takes place within a couple of seconds. Maybe a minute.
So there you have it. Thats what emails are, and how they work.
Robert
Postcard Virus Warning.
I got this email today and thought I might share it with you.
If its a hoax, so be it. But I would rather be safe than sorry.
Virus on its way. read and let people know about it.
http://www.snopes.com/computer/virus/postcard.asp
Hi All, I checked with Norton Anti-Virus, and they are gearing up for this
virus!
I checked Snopes (URL above:), and it is for real!!
Get this E-mail message sent around to your contacts ASAP.
PLEASE FORWARD THIS WARNING AMONG FRIENDS, FAMILY AND CONTACTS!
You should be alert during the next few days. Do not open any message with
an attachment entitled ‘POSTCARD,’ regardless of who sent it to you. It is a
virus which opens A POSTCARD IMAGE, which ‘burns’ the whole hard disc C of
your computer.
This virus will be received from someone who has your e-mail address in
his/her contact list. This is the reason why you need to send this e-mail to
all your contacts It is better to receive this message 25 times than to
receive the virus and open it.
If you receive a mail called’ POSTCARD,’ even though sent to you by a
friend, do not open it!
This is the worst virus announced by CNN. It has been classified by
Microsoft as the most destructive virus ever. This virus was discovered by
McAfee yesterday, and there is no repair yet for this kind of virus. This
virus simply destroys the Zero Sector of the Hard Disc, where the vital
information is kept.
Snopes lists all the names it could come in.
