New computer virus threat
Posted: Thu Nov 28, 2002 3:04 pm
And this one, you approve of and your virus software won't detect it!
Those cute little electronic
greeting cards you occasionally get from friends may be a real problem.
There's a new card company called "FriendGreetings.com". When you get a
card notification from them and click on the link, it will take you to
their site. You will be notified that you have to install an
ActiveX control in order to view the card. When you begin to install, the
first thing that pops up is what is known as a "EULA" (End User License
Agreement). It is very long, and you are not likely to read it.
They're counting on that. When you scroll to the bottom of it and click
"Accept," you have agreed to the terms of the EULA.
Part of what you will have agreed to is to have monitoring/spyware
software installed on your computer which will periodically report a vast
array of data back to the card company. The other part that you've agreed
to is to have the software send mail to every single address in your
address book. In short, you've voluntarily agreed to install a virus-type
product on your machine.
For more details, see: www.snopes.com/computer/virus/friend.htm. Se the
example at the bottom of the page.
Since there is no virus in the email, and since you are voluntarily
agreeing to install the activex component, virus checkers will not catch
this.