August
7
Fake CNN Email Hides Virus
You can't be too vigilant about incoming email. I'm usually pretty sharp about this sort of web lure, but late last night after a long cross-country flight I clicked on a link in an email entitled CNN.com Daily Top 10:
1. Air force one crashes in Iraq2. Merrill Lynch files for bankruptcy
3. Torture widespread in Palestinian jails
4. Merrill Lynch files for bankruptcy
5. Torture widespread in Palestinian jails
6. Ex-Google engineers debut 'Cuil' way to search
7. Massive earthquake in Japan kills thousands
8. Yankees plane crashes over Minnesota
9. Definition of a woman’s G-spot
10. Cuil - new google-ish search engine
When I clicked on Merrill Lynch files for bankruptcy, it was a video file and a sign flashed that I needed to upgrade my Flash player. I obediently downloaded the player and went to bed.
This morning, in the sober light of day, I instantly recognized these stories as totally bogus. There's the repetition, for one thing, and the impossibility that so many bad things could happen in one day. The email address was also suspect: not CNN. If I fell for it, though, so did a lot of other folks.
Luckily, I have a Mac; I moved the uninstalled whatever-it-was into the trash and dumped it. Idiot.
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And not the only one - suddenly I'm getting Breaking News and My alerts emails which my program puts into spam, and they also have no CNN address, but one of them looked legitimate; oh dear, thank goodnes I have a good virus program.... DO NOT open emails that you think are from CNN unless you can confirm that they really are..oh, help....
Posted by: Barbara Masse | August 09, 2008 at 11:58 AM
I've been watching your show today and the topic of rep. earmarks. was up. Hey,,,Obama has HIS promise to eliminate all earmarks and pork. It really doesn't matter who put them there and who their for does it? If Obama doesn't live up to his campaign promises, then let the ear marks be. Much to the tax payers dismay,, which incidentaly appear that we are going to be paying taxes on PRINTED money. Doesn't make sense does it? Let us hear something about that. We see the image of money being printed on every news show, but nothing is said about it. Why is that?
Posted by: Julie Kovein | March 08, 2009 at 05:53 PM