Re: virus: VIRUS ALERT !! (was GOOD TIMES)

John ''Actual Size'' Williams (prefect@tricon.net)
Wed, 13 Aug 1997 09:13:40 -0400

At 01:08 PM 8/13/97 +0100, you wrote:
>I usually wouldn't bother forwarding any kind of message like this, but
>since it came round the building flash-mail I figured that it might be
>worth sending, since anyone sending hoax emails round like that is
>liable to get their arse chewed off by management.
>
>I've stripped off all email addresses, purely as protocol.
>
>Highly infectious meme, or real threat, do you think?

The aol4free thought-virus is even worse than the GOOD TIMES virus, because
there *is* an aol4free trojan horse that does something similar. See this
CIAC[1] Bulletin [http://ciac.llnl.gov/ciac/bulletins/h-47a.shtml]: "CIAC
has obtained a Trojaned copy of AOL4FREE.COM that destroys hard drives.
NOTE: This is different from the AOL4FREE Virus Warning hoax message."

Since it's a trojan horse, McAfee Virus Scan won't detect it.

This is cunning, since if Clueless X goes to his friend who told him Good
Times is a hoax and says, "is aol4free a hoax too?" Clueless X's friend
will say "no" and pass it along.

However, the virus does not work as described; opening the e-mail message
does not activate the trojan horse. Like all trojan horses, you have to
actually run the program.

"Penpal Greetings," of course, is just a mutation of the Good Times virus.
>From the CIAC: "The PENPAL GREETINGS! Hoax shown below appears to be an
attempt to kill an e-mail chain letter by claiming that it is a self
starting Trojan that destroys your hard drive and then sends copies of
itself to everyone whose address is in your mailbox."
"http://ciac.llnl.gov/ciac/CIACHoaxes.html"

In case anyone's interested in the flap this like this caused:
http://ciac.llnl.gov/ciac/bulletins/h-05.shtml [and other links contained
within]

(Offical CIAC statement on the Good Times virus, among others...)

Here's something interesting I need to check out; someone watchdoging virus
hoaxes:

http://kumite.com/myths/

A history of "Good Times" is here:
http://www.nsm.smcm.edu/News/GTHoax.html
(I was hit by the first varient! Of course, it didn't fool me, since I knew
what E-Mail was and was not...)

Let me know if you find any other interesting Virus Hoax stuff: I love
reading about these! :-)

-- John

---
[1]U.S. Department of Energy Computer Incident Advisory Capability
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John Williams            ICQ Address: 1213689          prefect@tricon.net
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