Virus warning

Allan spake thusly upon matters weighty:

> Sorry, this is a hoax. You can't, repeat CAN NOT, get a virus from a

Allan, I hate to burst your bubble. This is definitely a hoax. It used to be,
you could not get a virus from email. Due to all the active content now, Web
links, active X controls, Java enabled mail readers, etc, I am not ENTIRELY
sure this is as true as it once was. Whereas it is true that just looking at
ascii text is pretty undamaging, it is just possible that if your mailer acts
on web links or stuff like that to invoke external executable code, you might
be able to be 'affected' by some such thing.

I'm not positive, but it isn't the same world as it once was. The more active
content becomes and the more capable mailers and other tools become in
handling such content (and the more automagically they do it....), the greater
the risk of such viruses. Frankly, I turn all of that stuff off in my mailer,
and I set my browser settings to confirm all that stuff (and sites that pop up
ten million frames go instantly on my hate list).

> This type of message is actually a virus itself. If you think about

I believe they refer to this as a 'concept virus'.

> Oh, and AOL doesn't make a habit of announcing virii. It's bad for

AOL might be a virus....

Tom.

/************************************************

> On Fri, 27 Mar 1998 17:31:26 -0500 Tom Pope <tpope@cs.cmu.edu> writes:
Don't forget, you can hang them from your christmas tree, with a colored light
sticking through the center hole, as well. They make really purty ornaments
that way.