North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

["Joe Hecksel" <jhecksel@voyager.net>]

> I am really glad you made this announcement.  I will not open files 
unless I know someone personally

I may be beating a dead horse, but my understanding is that many of 
these malicious programs hijack legitimate address books.  You cannot 
use the sender as a test of goodness.

Example:
Let's say I enjoy sharing humorous stories with my friends on the 
internet.  When I hear a new joke I send it to my friends A, B, C and D.  
Mr Virus will attach itself to an old message that I really did send to 
A, B, C and D and then resends it.  The email return address shows 
that it came from me (and it did come from my computer and went 
through my ISP account).  A, B, C and D are delighted to get another 
joke from me and pop the attachment open.  Bang!  They are infected.  
The life form replicates itself.

One strategy that I use is to limit max size mail downloads to 20kB.  
Many mail programs default to 50kB but can be set by the user.  The 
bearbug attachment is 51kB.  

-- 
Joe Hecksel
Personal Webpage http://my.voyager.net/~jhecksel