Hi all, I am forwarding a message that you all need to see. I, also, got a post from this person. He seemed to be sending me a "fix" for the problems that I had a while ago with the web page. I wrote back to him telling him that I did not EVER open unexpected attachments. I have not heard from him. I'll be letting the people know at Rootsweb, but this did not come to the mail list. It came personally in referrence to something I had put on the mail list. PLEASE be careful. I thought I was being silly by not opening up the attachment, but did not recognize the file type. I guess this is a very good lesson for us not to open attachments until you have verified their safety by asking the sender! MAKE SURE YOU HAVE YOUR VIRUS CHECKER UPDATED!!! ****** Forwarded Message Follows ******* Hi Judy, I thought I should let you know what happened to me yesterday through a inquiry I placed on the Huron-L site, I had asked about my John Singer of New London, and I received a personal reply from someone named PAUL THOMAS grayston@comteck.com This is what was in the mailing. "Myrna Casey wrote: Hi Deborah, I saw your message about the Ryan's, and noticed your from the Norwalk Library. I have been trying to find John A. Singer......(It continues from there, but I'll leave it out as this isn't the part that is a problem.) This Paul person wrote: >Take a look to the attachment. When I checked out the attachment my virus protection came on and said it was a infected file. It could not fix it, clean it or anything, so I deleted it. I also wrote back to "Paul" and told him, but so far I haven't had any response back. I don't know if he's a regular member of this mailing list, I don't remember seeing his name before, and I've been on it for over a year I believe, and I'm worried he may be someone who is jumping in and sending virus's on purpose. I've had experience with that happening before, and since he hasn't responded, I thought you may want to check him out, maybe he's associated with the Library in Norwalk, and it's perfectly innocent, but it bother's me. I don't want others on the list to get reply's and end up with a virus if this is hanky panky. The reason I'm kind of suspicious is that no one else has been able to find any info on John since the 1880 census of Ashland Co., and this really looked good, but thank goodness my program grabbed the monster. I decided to write to you personally, so as not to upset others. Let me know what you think. Myrna Singer Casey

Don't blame Paul. There is a virus going around "WB32Bad TransA" My virus checker wasn't updated & I "caught" it on Tuesday. The person who sent it didn't know & likewise I sent it & didn't know. The virus sends itself to people in your address book, that's what a virus does. it doesn't wip anything out but is very annoying and embarassing. So please don't blame individuals. I updated & disinfected my computer. Below was a message I rec'd on another list concerning this virus: > McAfee discovered a nasty new Internet worm "in the wild" on April 11, 2001 > and traced its origin to New Zealand. They officially dubbed it > W32/Badtrans@MM. Tell me more > Symantec's Antivirus Research Center uncovered the new virus on the same day > and decided to call it W32.Badtrans.13312@mm. Tell me more. > F-Secure spotted the worm on its radar a day later and added it to their > rogue's gallery as simply BadTrans. Tell me more.. > Whatever you call it, this new email virus is a bad boy, with a > password-stealing Trojan routine that could potentially cause a surprising > amount of damage. Today I'll tell you how bad it is, how to protect yourself > and all about Microsoft's big plans to eradicate this type of virus > altogether. > > IT'S BAD, IT'S NATIONWIDE > Since its discovery two weeks ago, I've seen a sharp increase each day in > the number of BadTrans reports. Here's what you need to know: > > How do I spot BadTrans? The BadTrans worm works by replying to email > messages. When you send email to a machine infected with BadTrans, the virus > replies with your original message and an attached file, plus the single > line "Take a look to the attachment." The message appears to come from > someone you know. The attachment may have any of 16 randomly chosen > filenames (Pics.ZIP.scr or YOU_are_FAT!.TXT.pif, for example) with a final > extension of .pif or .scr. > > How do I protect myself? For starters, don't double-click on the attachment. > If you receive a message that includes a suspicious attachment, delete it > and contact the person who sent it to you (by phone, preferably). Make sure > your antivirus software is up-to-date. Tell me more. > > How do I get rid of it? Current versions of every leading antivirus program > easily detect and remove the BadTrans virus. > > A POSSIBLE CURE? > Critics have hammered Microsoft for years, complaining that its software is > too vulnerable to viruses. All that changed a few months ago when Microsoft > released Service Pack 2 for Office 2000. More changes are in store when > Office XP hits the streets on May 31. > > How it will work: If you've installed the Outlook 2000 Email Security Update > or upgraded to Outlook 2002, you're completely protected from BadTrans and > other attachment-borne viruses. Unfortunately, this "protection" also blocks > some legitimate file attachments. > > The new Outlook versions scan every incoming message for attachments. The > security patch for Outlook 2000 completely hides any file whose extension > appears on Microsoft's "Level 1" list of potential viruses. Tell me more. > Outlook 2002 is more informative: You see an error message that includes the > full name of the file and a note that Outlook blocked access to it.