I wanted to let you know that the Klez virus that's going around was found on my computer. I hope emails from me didn't infect other computers, but pasted below is information about how to get rid of the virus in case you need it. Please pass this information along to members of the IEC legislative roundtable list and the Rural Advocacy list.
Erin Jordahl
Director, Iowa Chapter Sierra Club
3839 Merle Hay Road, Suite 280
Des Moines, IA 50310
515-277-8868
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This was sent out by the Clean Water Network.
The purpose of this message is to inform/remind people that you have to
do more than use virus protection to combat some viruses, including the
Klez worm that is now circulating widely.
The message has:
1) essential information on how to not get the virus; 2) how to increase
your existing electronic virus protection, and 3) instructions on getting
rid of the Klez virus if you are infected.
1. FIRST, DO NOT OPEN OR PREVIEW e-mails that appear to be suspicious.
You do NOT need to open the attachment to get the Klez virus.
Klez virus messages have an attachment and are usually between 90,000 and
130,000 bytes in the size column.
Some have forged return addresses from "postmaster@........"
The subject line, message bodies, and attachment file names are random.
The From address is randomly-chosen from email addresses that the worm
finds on the infected computer. Because this worm uses a randomly chosen
address that it finds on an infected computer as the "From:" address,
numerous cases have been reported in which users of uninfected computers
received complaints that they sent an infected message to someone else.
The email message that this worms sends is composed of "random" strings.
The subject can be one of the following:
Undeliverable mail--"[Random word]"
Returned mail--"[Random word]"
a [Random word] [Random word] game
a [Random word] [Random word] tool
a [Random word] [Random word] website
a [Random word] [Random word] patch
[Random word] removal tools
how are you
let's be friends
darling
so cool a flash, enjoy it
your password
honey
some questions
please try again
welcome to my hometown
the Garden of Eden
introduction on ADSL
meeting notice
questionnaire
congratulations
sos!
japanese girl VS playboy look,my beautiful girl friend
eager to see you
spice girls' vocal concert
japanese lass' sexy pictures
2. SECOND, Use anti-virus protection but bear in mind that this may not
be enough because the virus can easily be altered (reason for all of the
above). If you haven't been hit by Klez, it's extremely important that
you take the following steps to secure your machine against email-borne
viruses. Here's what you should do:
1) Install and run up-to-date virus protection software.
2) Disable or uninstall the Windows Scripting Host
3) Make file extensions visible
4) Disable scripts running from within email messages
5) Run Windows Update to apply all current security fixes.
An excellent source for this is OneNW - a resource for environmental
organizations. This is a link to how to do all of the above:
http://www.onenw.org/bin/page.cfm?pageid=14
3. THIRD, Rid yourself of the virus if caught. Download and run
Symantec's free Klez removal tool available from:
http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/w32.klez.removal.too
l.html
(Note that this URL may be too long to display on one line in your
e-mail client, in which case you may need to copy and paste it in two
pieces into your browser address bar.)
Be sure to read the instructions on the page mentioned above for running
the tool properly. In particular, you need to run the tool in Windows'
"safe mode".
The Symantec page mentioned above contains detailed instructions for
starting your computer in "safe mode" and using the tool. Print out the
page before starting the cleaning procedure so that you can refer to the
instructions throughout the entire process.