Article ID: 266059 - Last Review: August 30, 2007 - Revision: 2.2

Information About Outlook E-mail Attachments and Worm Viruses

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SUMMARY

Many corporate networks have been affected by worm viruses that are spread through e-mail messages as attachments. When you open the attachment, the virus is automatically sent to random e-mail addresses in your global address book. Additionally, these viruses may copy themselves onto your computer's hard disk and any shared drives to which you have access.

MORE INFORMATION

There have been several variations of these viruses. Some of the viruses include those that are in the following list: 
Name                   Subject line             Associated files
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Life Stages            Fw: Life Stages          lifestages.txt.shs
                       Fw: Funny
                       Fw: Jokes
                       Fw: Life Stages text
                       Fw: Funny text
                       Fw: Jokes text
                       Life Stages
                       Funny
                       Jokes
                       Life Stages text
                       Funny text
                       jokes text

Love Letter            ILOVEYOU                 BugFix I-Worm.Loveletter
                                                IRC/Loveletter
                                                Love Bug
                                                LOVE-LET.VBS
                                                LOVE-LETTER-FOR-YOU.TXT.vbs
                                                Loveletter
                                                Troj/LoveLet-A
                                                VBS.Loveletter.a
                                                VBS/LoveLet-A
                                                VBS/LoveLet-B
                                                VBS/LoveLet-C
                                                VBS/LoveLet-E
                                                VBS_LoveLetter
                                                veryfunny.vbs

Love Letter            FW: <filename.ext>       where <filename.ext>
Variations                                      can be any file name and
                                                any extension
To help prevent the spread of malicious e-mail attachments, Microsoft has released the Outlook E-mail Security Update. For additional information about the Outlook E-mail Security Update, click the article numbers below to view the articles in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:
262631  (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/262631/EN-US/ ) OL2000: Outlook E-mail Attachment Security Update
262617  (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/262617/EN-US/ ) OL98: Information About the Outlook E-mail Security Update
263275  (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/263275/EN-US/ ) OL97: The Outlook E-mail Security Update Is Not Available for Outlook 97

Microsoft also recommends that you take the following precautions:
  • Ensure that you are running the latest version of your anti virus software.
  • Never share an entire hard disk; share only specific folders to specific users as required.
  • When you share a folder, never allow unrestricted access to it; always use a strong password to protect the share or limit access to the share to specific users.
  • Whenever possible, do not use persistent, mapped network drives (mapped drives that are reconnected each time that you log on).
APPLIES TO
  • Microsoft Outlook 98 Standard Edition
  • Microsoft Outlook 97 Standard Edition
  • Microsoft Outlook 2000 Standard Edition
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