On 5 Apr 99, at 19:14, Linda Aldridge wrote:

>   This is the first time I've ever heard of a virus being contained
> in something other than an executable or a "macro", and I honestly
> don't know what would have happened if I attempted to open it.

  I use LViewPro to open downloaded .JPG images.  If the contents of the
file aren't really a .JPG (or one of the other formats it recognizes), it
reports "file type not supported".  So as a first line, one is only going
to be hit by this if one has .JPG and .DOC set to open with the same
program, and that program executes macros.  [It may be possible to
configure IE4 or IE5 to meet these criteria....]

> I "cleaned" it with Norton, changed the extension to ".doc", and
> found that it contains a list of Adult Porn Sites with passwords for
> them.

  When LViewPro doesn't like a file I've wasted time downloading, rather
than just write it off as a loss, sometimes I use QuickView to see if maybe
it's just uuencoded or MIMEified.  If I were to recognize it as a document
file, it's conceivable that I might change the extension to .doc, although
personally I'm more likely to use .wri.  If I hadn't updated my antivirus
software, that would give the virus a second chance to infect my machine.

> Please be careful folks.

  Stuff downloaded from newsgroups should not inspire a whole lot of
trust....


David G

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