Computer virus (?) Help?

[PierBridge]

Today at 4:09 pm I receive 44 of these emails being returned (?) to me...which of course I never sent. Question is...is this my problem, or someone elses?<br />In checking my sent mail folder...they were never sent. What bothers me...some is the .rr.rochester.net ISP provider is listed on each one of them....I've deleted the link that was attached...and which I didn't open. Any thought from you gurus out there?<br /><br />************<br />The following message to <DELETED@rochester.rr.com> was undeliverable.<br />The reason for the problem:<br />5.1.0 - Unknown address error 550-'5.1.1 unknown or illegal alias: (DELETED@rochester.rr.com'<br /><br /><br />Final-Recipient: rfc822;DELETED@rochester.rr.com<br />Action: failed<br />Status: 5.0.0 (permanent failure)<br />Diagnostic-Code: smtp; 5.1.0 - Unknown address error 550-'5.1.1 unknown or illegal alias: DELETED@rochester.rr.com' (delivery attempts: 0)<br />Reporting-MTA: dns; clmboh-mx-01.mgw.rr.com<br /><br /><br />Subject:<br />Dresden 1945<br />From:<br />ME DELETED@comcast.net<br />Date:<br />Sun, 15 May 2005 18:54:16 UTC<br />To:<br />DELETED@rochester.rr.com

 

[one more cast]

Re: Computer virus (?) Help?

I just went through the same thing. Roadrunner had me run 3 or 4 different virus scans and we couldn't get rid of it so we ended up reinstalling the startup disc or whatever its called and doing a system repair. Then we installed the free virus protection from RR and everything seems to be fine now.

 

[Xcusme]

Re: Computer virus (?) Help?

One thing you could do is to look at the e-mail headers of those mails. Therein you could see the source of the originating e-mail server. <br /><br />A couple to things could be afoot here.<br /><br />Say I get your e-mail addy. I spoof your e-mail address and mail out an e-mail to some nonexistent e-mail address with an infected attachment. The e-mail looks like it came from you. Since the intended nonexistent e-mail address doesn't exist, it gets returned ( to you). You say to yourself...'Hey, I don't remember sending this to anyone', you open the attachment...ZAAAP..you're infected.<br />Or in this case, you clicked on the attached link...you get the idea...<br /><br />You could have an e-mail Worm. It would use it's own SMTP mailing engine that would send mails from your machine behind your back , so to speak. You would have no record of any mails going out.<br /><br />It goes without saying that running a good virus program , with updated virus definitions, is a must these days. A good soft firewall program can help stop this sort of thing too. The firewall program will watch which programs have access to the Web and allow only your e-mail client program to e-mail from your machine and only on certain ports. <br /><br />I wouldn't be a bad idea to swing over to Trend Micro's web site and do an online scan of your system...it's free. It called Housecall.

 

[one more cast]

Re: Computer virus (?) Help?

Xcusme, I did 3 or 4 free different online scans when I was having this trouble and got 3 or 4 completely different results. The first one found something like 40 infected files then it said they were all deleted or cleaned. The second scan from a different site found 15 infected files and the last one found 49 infected files. all scans were ran back to back.

 

[Xcusme]

Re: Computer virus (?) Help?

Sometimes doing just an online scan (or off-line scan) won't totally rid you of the problem. Some will re-generate upon the next bootup. Doing a scan before the Windows GUI loads (safe mode) is sometimes needed, before the bug loads memory resident. Doing the scan in safe mode, kills the Mothership. Having recommended OS security patches helps too. It's really a battle out there trying to keep your system clean and is a 24/7 job. Alas, sometimes, the only solution is to backup your data and do the Restore OS thing. I won't go into a rant here, but, it eerks me to no end to know that on most folks machines, there are open services ( thanks to Microsoft ) that are never used,needed, or wanted that leave them open for exploits. Simply turning off those un-needed services can greatly slam the door to many problems. End of semi-rant.

 

[malibu4u]

Re: Computer virus (?) Help?

Okay Xcusme,explain yourself about keeping services open that aren't needed. You left a cliff hanger here. What should we be looking for?????

 

[Xcusme]

Re: Computer virus (?) Help?

OK, this might take just a bit of light reading, but it's not hard to do, editing the Services thing, that is.<br /><br />One of the more popular sites on the web was Black Vipers site for this info. Recently, Black Vipers site went down (rumor has it that he lost his domain name and hasn't put his pages back up). But all is not lost. His web pages are archived at this link: Black Viper Archive <br /><br />Black Viper had the services listed by Operating System (WinXp, Win2k etc.) with common settings for each service. <br /><br />Start by looking at this site first and get the feel of how it's done and then go to the Black Viper archive link above. I like the BV site better. Elder Geek... <br /><br />Hopefully, BV will get his site back up and running soon.

 

[rwise]

Re: Computer virus (?) Help?

adware and spyware can also be the problem, I was getting a number of e-mails like that a while back, got ride of the spyware and no more e-mails.

 

[PierBridge]

Re: Computer virus (?) Help?

Thanks for the replies I am still out of town, I should have told you I am retrieving my E-mails on the road and not from my computer yet so hopefully the problem is on someone elses computer.