Outlook 2007 does a good job of letting you know when you receive emails that look suspicious. Here’s a couple of things I immediately look for in a seemingly weird or unexpected email.

1.) Is there an attachment? Anytime I receive an email with an attachment I’m always leery of the file. Even if it’s from someone I know. If I didn’t expect it, I usually don’t ever open it.

2.) Be aware of patterns. Does the "sender" normally contact you by email? Do they ever send you a file via email? In the case of the email above from Microsoft, Microsoft wouldn’t email you a file, they almost exclusively provide files for download from their website specifically.

3.) Look for actual link targets in email. Any links in the body of the message, hover over it and look at the tooltip or status bar to see where the link is really pointing. In my opinion, if it’s to an IP address or an uncommon domain name or top level domain, don’t click the link!

That’s my trio of email triage questions I work through with suspicious emails. They’ve protected me for quite some time. Hopefully they’ll be helpful to you as well.

Image: screenshot of email received in Outlook 2007

Post from: EveryJoe

Paying Attention to Tricky Email Phishing Scams

Back Image Source: www.sxc.hu

The question is did I need to be worried?

Conficker.C began using a new algorithm on Wednesday to look for instructions from its creator, prompting speculation that it might be readying for an attack. According to security experts, however, the worm has been quiet so far.

Am I just enjoying a false sense of security in all of this or is my ignorance my bliss? Honestly I haven’t had a serious malware or virus infection in quite some time. I can’t even remember the last time I spent any real amount of effort cleaning up from an infection or having to rebuild a system due to a virus.

I’m not the only one blissful in my ignorance either it appears. I love David Coursey’s humorous outlook on the whole Conficker hoopla:

The Conficker Worm is like the Paris Hilton of computer security: Famous solely for being famous. Neither has actually ever done anything of note. But, at least Paris has a sense of humor about her celebrity. Conficker just wastes people’s time.

Now that’s funny folks. What’s been your experience? Have you been impacted or bothered really at all, that is except for all the news alerts and blips about it in your feed readers?

Source: Conficker Worm Is Much Ado About Nothing, Conficker May Be More Widespread Than Previously Thought

Post from: EveryJoe

Conficker Worm – Did I Miss Something

The iServices.A Trojan horse is found in pirated copies of the said software. Once it’s installed it connects to remote servers. The trojan also allows the creator to take control of your Mac.

Intego, a Mac security software firm estimates that roughly 20,000 machines have been infected as of January 21, 2009. As a precaution users are asked not to download software from untrusted sources.

The approach of this trojan is genius. It works around the limitations of the Mac operating system and instead it exploits the flaw of the users. One flaw is greed. Mac users wanting to save money resort to downloading pirated copies of software instead of buying original versions. Hence opening themselves to attacks such as this. Wherein they literally welcome the trojan with open arms.

Several things you can do to avoid this. 1. Don’t download pirated software. 2. Download applications directly from developer’s sites or the Apple web site. 3. Now is probably a good time to start thinking about Anti-virus software. It’s better safe than sorry.

That being said, the Mac OS X is still pretty much a safe platform. If you’ve been infected the removable tool can be downloaded here.

Post from: EveryJoe

Is The Mac Not Invincible Anymore?

Still the question still begs to be asked, “do you need antivirus software on your Mac?”. Macworld has a good article published recently on that. Make sure to read through the comments as well to get both sides.

The article discusses the differences between a virus, trojan, spyware, etc…

Honestly I don’t use any antivirus software on my Mac. I should probably be a good neighbor and use it for the sake of other people but as of now I am just practicing safe computing.

My advice to computer users whether it be Mac or Windows people is to practice several safety precautions. Don’t visit sites that you’re not sure are trust worthy, don’t open attachments automatically (verify the source), don’t forward email without making sure it’s ok, don’t open email attachments from people you don’t know and other common sense things.

The Mac OS is built on a system that makes it difficult for malicious programs to take advantage of it. So while the Mac is gaining market share and more and more people are taking notice, I don’t think it’s quite as easy to write malicious programs for the Mac as it is on Windows. Thus the incidence of virus and other programs alike are smaller compared to Windows. Will there be a time that antivirus software on a Mac will be as common as antivirus on Windows? Maybe… but for now it isn’t.

My honest take is that it’s always better to have antivirus software on your computer but it’s not a must on a Mac. At least not yet.

Post from: EveryJoe

Antivirus Software: Yes or No?