[gui-talk] important alert.

Tue Mar 3 23:44:55 UTC 2009

In addition, if you read the warning carefully, you will see certain
words that are run together, such as, "AOLhas." It seems that if this
were a real warning, then it would have been written like one, and not
have grammar/spelling errors in it such as the above.

Wayne

On 3/3/09, Joel Deutsch <jdeutsch at dslextreme.com> wrote:
> I agree with everything Steve says, and I wouldn't have bothered with Snopes
> myself because 1. he's right about the warning signals that something may
> well be bogus and 2. because a warning almost identical to this one in its
> wording got forwarded to a young middle school friend of mine who's
> inexperienced in stuff like this, and she passed it on to me as well as to
> other friends. So that time, instead of asking her to trust me about why the
> warning was probably worthless, I checked it out myself at Snopes and then
> sent her the Snopes URL so she could see for herself not only this specific
> information but a resource to which she could turn when such things came to
> her in the future. So now she's the virus hoax guru of her 7th grade class,
> I guess. How cool is that.
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Steve Jacobson" <steve.jacobson at visi.com>
> To: "NAPUB Mailing List" <napub at nfbnet.org>; "NFBnet GUI Talk Mailing List"
> <gui-talk at nfbnet.org>
> Sent: Tuesday, March 03, 2009 12:44 PM
> Subject: Re: [gui-talk] important alert.
>
>
> I'd like to add to what Joel advises here.  Usually you don't need to even
> go to Snopes but only check for a couple of things to figure out if a
> warning is real or not.
>
> If a warning tells you to "send it to everyone you know," you should be
> suspicious.  Most reasonable people would trust you to know to whom you
> should send such
> a warning.
>
> When generic terms like "this morning" without day or date are used, it
> should strike you that this could have been written three years ago and
> would still sound just
> as urgent.  There should be a specific date given.
>
> If it mentions companies without any contact names, again be suspicious.
>
> In this case, if it says "norton" instead of Symantec, the company that
> produces it, that should be a pretty good sign that somebody is misleading
> you.
>
> Finally, the important thing isn't who forwarded it to any of us, but
> whether we can tell who wrote the original note.  We have all forwarded
> things like this when we
> were starting out so the person who forwarded this to Ken is probably very
> reliable.  If you don't know the name of the person who wrote the original
> note, though, be
> suspicious.  There is always some point where the forward list stops so you
> can't tell who wrote the note and they never claim credit in the body of the
> note.  The
> forwarder may be reliable, but the original author is into hiding and
> thinking about the millions of copies of his or here warning are going all
> over the world.
>
> Definitely check with Snopes or something before forwarding warnings as Joel
> suggests, but if any of the above are true, I don't even bother with that
> any longer.
>
> Best regards,
>
> Steve Jacobson
>
> On Tue, 3 Mar 2009 11:35:11 -0800, Joel Deutsch wrote:
>
>>Hi,
>
>>before freaking out about this supposed current virus threat, it would be
>>informative to read the information about it at Snopes.com, which
>>investigates, explains and evaluates such warnings. This one originated in
>>the fall of 2006, and much about it is interesting to read. here's the URL
>>of the Snopes page about this virus warning. if the link takes up two lines
>>in your eamail, as it does in mine, first note where the line break is,
>>then
>>copy and paste the entire URL into your browser's address bar, but then
>>look
>>for the place where the line break was and make sure there's no space there
>>to break up the URL, by deleting a space if you find one.
>
>> http://search.atomz.com/search/?sp-q=mail+server+report&sp-a=00062d45-sp00000000&sp-advanced=1&sp-p=all&sp-w-control=1&sp-w=alike&sp-date-range=-1
> &sp-x=any&sp-c=100&sp-m=1&sp-s=0----- Original Message -----From:
> <Kenlawrence124 at aol.com>To: <gui-talk at nfbnet.org>Cc: <napub at nfbnet.org>Sent:
> Tuesday, March 03, 2009 10:46 AMSubject: [gui-talk] important alert.Hi list
> members I can confirm that what I'm posting below is real and thesorce is
> credible This
> was forwarded to me by a music contact please payattention.          >
> URGENT> >> >> > THIS IS VERY SERIOUS, PLEASE  SENDTO EVERYONE ON YOUR>
> E-MAIL LIST!!> >> >  Anyone-using Internet mail such as Yahoo , Hotmail ,> >
> AOL and so  on.> >> > This information arrived this morning,>  > Direct from
> both
> Microsoft and Norton> >> > Please send  it to everybody you know who has> >
> Access to the Internet.>  >> > You may receive an apparently harmless e-mail
> titled>
> 'Mail Server Report'> >> > If you open either file, a  message will appear
> on your> screen saying: 'It is> too late now,  your life is no longer
> beautiful.'> >> >
> Subsequently you  will LOSE EVERYTHING IN YOUR PC,> > And the person who
> sent it to you  will gain access to> your> > Name, e-mail and password.>  >>
>  >
> This is a new virus which started to circulate on>  Saturday afternoon.> >
> AOLhas  already confirmed the seve rity,  and the anti> virus software's
> are> not capable
> of destroying  it.> >> > The virus has been created by a hacker who  calls>
> himself> > 'life owner'.> >> >  PLEASE SEND A COPY OF THIS E-MAIL> > TO ALL
> YOUR FRIENDS, And ask them  to> > PASS IT ON IMMEDIATELY!> >> > THIS HAS
> BEEN  CONFIRMED BY SNOPES.> >> >
> _http://www.snopes.com/computer/virus/mailserver.asp_(http://www.snopes.com/computer/virus/mailserver.asp)Block
> quote endI pledge to  participate actively
> in the efforts of the national federationof the blind to  achieve equality,
> opportunity, and security for the blind;tosupport the  policies and programs
> of the federation;
> and abide by itsconstitution.**************Need a job? Find employment help
> in your area.(http://yellowpages.aol.com/search?
> query=employment_agencies&ncid=emlcntusyelp00000005)_______________________________________________gui-talk
> mailing listgui-
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