• Words From Microsoft
• New Love
• Are You Safe From the Love Bug Now?
• The Frustration Buster™ - Internet Invitations
• Listener Questions
• Getting But Not Giving

Thanks to Jim Smith, Managing Partner from Microsoft, for joining us on the show to tell you about Microsoft's stance on the recent Love Bug and New Love virus attacks and on Microsoft's upcoming security fixes for Microsoft Outlook 98 and Outlook 2000 (Outlook Express does not currently have a security fix in development). The patches, which will limit some of Outlook's functionality and ease of use to provide additional security, should be available this week. As soon as the security patches are released, we will place links for you on this page. Meanwhile, you can find out more information about the upcoming patches on Microsoft's Office Update site.

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New Love

A new, even nastier virus than the Love Bug has begun circulating, and its being called "New Love." Like the VBS.LoveLetter worm, the VBS.NewLove worm spreads itself via the Outlook address book when it is activated. However, it's a bit scarier than the Love Bug because it randomly chooses the attachment name and email subject from the Windows recently used document list. This makes it harder for users to identify the email as a virus host, and the attachment as a virus. Whenever this new worm replicates and sends itself, VBS.NewLove also alters the text included in its programming code. This makes it less detectable by anti-virus scanners.

The VBS.NewLove worm, upon activation, not only replicates and delivers itself via the address book, it also disastrously affects the computer system. VBS.NewLove attempts to delete the content of ALL FILES not currently in use, reducing the file size to zero, which effectively cripples Windows. This occurs on all local and mapped shared drives.

Here are the specs on VBS.NewLove:

• The subject of the delivery email varies: "FW:filename.ext" where filename represents a randomly-chosen document from the user's recently opened document list.
• The name of the attachment also varies to match the filename mentioned above, but will always end in .vbs - "filename.ext.vbs."
• There is no text in the body of the email.

Note: We recommend immediately updating the virus definition files for your anti-virus software whenever a new and dangerous infection (such as the Love Bug or New Love) begins to spread.

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Are You Safe From the Love Bug Now?

It's now been two weeks since the Love Bug worm first began to circulate. Here are step-by-step instructions to help determine if your inbox is safe, or if there are remnants of the bug left.

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The Frustration Buster™
Internet Invitations

Thanks to Cindy Harris, our Internet Frustration Buster™, for talking about her online party strategist - Yahoo! Invites. Sign up with Yahoo! and have access to their party invitation management/delivery, and make sending and tracking invitations and responses a breeze!

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Listener Questions
Getting But Not Giving

Listener Samuel from California is receiving mail OK, but is unable to send mail. Each time he tries, he gets a server error. We suspect that Samuel's mail server may simply be incorrectly indicated. Here's how Samuel can check:

1. Go to the [Tools] menu and select [Accounts].
   
   
   
   
2. In the Internet Accounts window, click on the [Mail] tab.
   
   
   
   
3. Push the [Properties] button.
   
   
   
   
4. Select the [Servers] tab.
   
   
   
   
5. Locate the "Outgoing Mail(SMTP)" field, and verify the name and spelling of the SMTP server. If you are unsure of the server name, your ISP can provide the information.