SPAM

[Lollie]

Hi

Recently I have started receiving lots of emails, diverted to my spam box, but usually are sent from a name, which will probably inclue something similar to true emails I receive, also there will be words in the titles same or similar to ones in my true box.  Is something reading my eamils or scanning sites I have visited to  pick out things that would encourage me to open the mails.  On the odd accasion I have opened the mail, not the attachment, it looks like a normal print email then instantly changes to something usually about finance???

Any advice, ideas?    I have Norton anti virus.

Lollie 

[Pierre ZFP]

You have Norton but do you have a spyware checker? Norton will trap viruses but may let other stuff through.  Do you run Zonealarm?

[Will]

If your Norton is up to date then it is highly unlikely anything will have infected your computer, but somebody else who has your e-mail in their address book, and presumably others on the same circulation lists as you, may not have been so careful. Likewise e-mail addresses that are published on the internet, even in forum posts, can easily be 'harvested' by spammers.

I get loads of them, and by looking at the subject matter and other pointers it's not difficult to work out that a certain Scandinavian PR company's mailing list has been invaded by a 'worm'. Though I also get people from this forum (their real names, not their forum names) offering me online 'medications'. Most of these mesages are inoffensive, but annoying - just don't open attachments you are unsure about, and keep your virus protection up to date, and you will be OK.

Programs like Mailwasher allow you to view the content before the message is downloaded to your computer, so unwanted mails can be deleted straight off the ISP's servers. That's particularly handy in the case of viruses or porn.

Edit - yes, I agree with the above. A spyware checker is always a good idea; it will no doubt tell you that you have loads of 'spyware' running on your machine, but most of this is probably innocuous. It only needs one harmful piece of program though.

[Cassis]

I do wish that the companies selling spyware checkers would not exaggerate the threats, essential though anti-spyware is.  It really isn't necessary for them to overstate the threat posted by innocent cookies and it makes it difficult to see the wood when they put so many trees in your way.  I know a lot of people disagree with all cookies on principle, but they do make web navigation a smoother experience and I have no problem as long as they are not used for subversive marketing etc.

Windows Defender is another piece of free anti-spyware downloadable online.

[Deimos]

[quote user="Cassis"]I do wish that the companies selling spyware checkers would not exaggerate the threats, essential though anti-spyware is.  It really isn't necessary for them to overstate the threat posted by innocent cookies and it makes it difficult to see the wood when they put so many trees in your way.  I know a lot of people disagree with all cookies on principle, but they do make web navigation a smoother experience and I have no problem as long as they are not used for subversive marketing etc.

Windows Defender is another piece of free anti-spyware downloadable online.
[/quote]

I completely agree. Run a lot of "Spyware checkers" and you get loads of stuff reported everything being innocent cookies !! If there was something nasty there it would never be noticed in the lists they give.

I've given them up and just use Windows Defender now. I assume it does the job - never "gone-off" but is does ask me bout stuff when I install new software (e.g. changes to startup menu, etc.).

Ian

[Gemini_man]

[quote user="Cassis"]I do wish that the companies selling spyware checkers would not exaggerate the threats, essential though anti-spyware is.  It really isn't necessary for them to overstate the threat posted by innocent cookies and it makes it difficult to see the wood when they put so many trees in your way.  I know a lot of people disagree with all cookies on principle, but they do make web navigation a smoother experience and I have no problem as long as they are not used for subversive marketing etc.

Windows Defender is another piece of free anti-spyware downloadable online.

[/quote]

but they make a LOT of money from scaremongering gullible users [:D]

in reality these days there are actually very few viruses about, malware is far more profitable but can be cleaned up easily by regular (once a week) scans - personally i use "Spybot - Search & Destroy - http://www.spybot.info/en/index.html" and "Ad-Aware SE - http://www.lavasoft.com/download_and_buy/product_comparison_chart.php" both of which are FREE and update every 2 weeks (they also have pay versions so be careful which you download) and for backup i actually paid for "Prevx1- http://www.prevx.com/products.asp" which at 19.50€ for 12 months is imo an excellent virus checker that does not try to scare the s*** out of you every other day [:D]

i hope this helps some of you, there are lots of people out there trying to make a living out of your fears [:)]

PS. happy to help if anyone needs it for these malware/virus checkers - PM me if you need it.