Charlie was right to warn people about the latest macro virus, but I would like
to temper what he relayed with further info. According to MSnbc, "if you open
the document, it will send 50 copies of itself to several e-mail addresses it
gleans from your personal e-mail"
1. This is not accurate: if you open a doc AND enable macros, you just did it
to your self. I receive macro viruses from students all the time (4 different
viruses from 9 different students this semester) and have NEVER been affected
because I enabled Word 97
macro checking (or Word 2000 HIGH security). To enable Word 97, On the Tools
menu, click Options, click the General tab, and then x the Macro virus
protection check box. When a doc is emailed to you and you open it, a box will
come up saying that there are macros and do you want to enable or disable the
macros. ALWAYS disable macros from anybody. If you think that there may be
legit macros, you can scan the doc with a virus checker before loading it or
copy the foreign doc into a new doc. Most macro viruses are Visual Basic that
works when you open or save documents. Legitimate macros, for example to help
with references and citations, should have nothing to do with saving or
loading. For me, the only foreign macro that I would consider using would come
from a co-author and then only after verification.
2. Even if you invoked the virus, the 50 copies come from Microsoft Outlook and
uses Microsoft's Internet Explorer. This is just one small reason why most
businesses and knowledgeable individuals use Netscape and never the Microsoft
Internet Explorer. Consider installing Netscape and then removing IE.
Http:\\www.98lite.net (not .com) tells how to remove IE from Windows 98 at no $
cost and recover 34 MB disk space plus the computer runs 15 to 25% with
Netscape and without IE.
3. MSNBC is partly owned by Microsoft (the MS part), which has no incentive to
tell people that the problem is centered in Microsoft Internet Explorer and
Outlook (and Word).
-- John N.