Hudson Valley Ski Club

Viruses and Identity Theft 

Publications from the Federal Trade Commission can be found on their website, www.consumer.gov/idtheft/:

"ID THEFT: What's It All About?" and "ID THEFT: When Bad Things Happen To Your Good Name" are available there in both text and PDF formats.  These booklets provide useful information about how thieves are using the Internet to steal your identity and what you can do about it.  (Many banks and credit unions have similar publications.)  Phone numbers and links for government agencies, credit bureaus and other organizations are also available there.

Online methods to steal your identity:

Although much information can be gathered about you with non-technical methods: stealing your trash ("dumpster diving"), stealing your mail, or pretending to have "legitimate" need for your information; much is also obtainable from you online if you fall for their scams:

• Scamming -- A scam is any fraudulent business scheme; a swindle.  Whether it's online or not.

• Spoofing -- A replica of an existing "legitimate" web page can be created to fool you into submitting personal, financial, or password information. (Banks have been particular targets of this scam).

• Spamming --  Spam is the unsolicited sending of e-mail, often of a commercial nature, indiscriminately to multiple mailing lists, individuals or newsgroups.  These e-mails include advertisements, viruses and hoaxes.  Spammers typically use computer programs that search public areas on the Internet to compile, capture, or otherwise "harvest" lists of email addresses from web pages, newsgroups, chat rooms, and other online destinations.

• Pfishing -- Criminals create and use "spam" to lure you into fake "spoof" websites to obtain personal data to commit identity theft.

With the increase in e-mail containing virus-infected attachments...  

some of it appearing* to come from Hudson Valley Ski Club or it's officers and members, I am taking this opportunity to provide the following information and rules.

* Some virus carriers are sent as if the mail came from one of our e-mail addresses, even though they were not.  Some mail has even been received from old e-mail address which are no longer used or even in existence.  You can no longer trust that e-mail is coming from "someone you know;" someone else could be using their e-mail address.

In order to minimize the exposure, we are doing the following:

1. All official e-mail coming from Hudson Valley Ski Club will come from the e-mail address hvscnews@aol.com or hvscnews@hvc.rr.com  (Obviously you might also receive legitimate individual e-mail from officers, chairpersons and other members)

2. No unsolicited e-mail from Hudson Valley Ski Club has ever (and probably will never) contain attachments or embedded executable files.  (Obviously if you request an image file, etc., I would consider that "solicited.")  

3. If there is the need to distribute club-wide information, I will put that information on the club website and only e-mail the link.

4. If there ever is a need to attach information to a club mailing, the content of the attachment will be described in the text of the message AND a verification of that mailing will appear on the club website.

To better protect yourself (and others,) you can do the following:

1. If you have not already done so, install a reliable virus-checker, keep it up-to-date (ie, subscribe to their update service,) and execute it frequently. If the checker provides the facility to update automatically, run automatically and check incoming and outgoing mail, use those facilities. [Click for note from Pete Gray]
   Most checkers give you the ability to delete or "quarantine" any infected files found.  Unless you really know what you're doing, get rid of those files.

2. Do not open an attachment claiming to be from Hudson Valley Ski Club unless it meets the rules described above.  If in doubt, contact me at hvscnews@aol.com

3. Do not open attachments unless you know what they are. Be suspicious if the attached file is unsolicited, if the name or descriptive text sounds "peculiar," or if there is no descriptive text in the body of the e-mail.

4. Be prudent regarding to whom you give your e-mail address (obviously people who are soliciting e-mail like people who are advertising, etc, are accepting the risk.)

5. Do not give out the password to the "Members Only" area of the club website.

To do your part in lessening the "Spam" problem, you can do the following:

There are programs out there which "harvest" your e-mail address and can be used to send you virus and other "Spam" (ie, undesired e-mail -- the equivalent of "snail-mail" junk mail.)  I have no reason to believe anyone in the club is deliberately responsible for propagating this e-mail, but there are steps you can take to lessen any chance that you are contributing.

1. Resist the impulse to bulk mail chain letters, hoax virus warnings, and other bogus mail. (Every e-mail of "free stuff" and almost every virus warning which I have received in the years I've been online has been a hoax.)

2. If you do feel the need to share a joke or "legitimate" warning, be sure to "sanitize" it, ie:

   1. Be sure it is legitimate (there are a variety of "hoax checkers" around, including the searchable US DoE (Department of Energy) CIAC Hoax Busters) as well as every virus checker software website.  Be very suspicious of any "warning" which:
      1. Offers something for nothing ("if it sounds to good to be true, it probably is...")
      2. Instructs you to turn off your virus checker (or tells you most virus checkers can't check for it--if it were a real virus you can feet pretty sure the virus checkers knew about it before you did!)
      3. Instructs you delete something from your operating system, allegedly dangerous (if there were something dangerous, your virus checker would probably have found it)
      4. Instructs you to "e-mail all your friends" (they're most likely trying to spread the damage)
      5. Offers the opportunity to "unsubscribe" (they're trying to confirm that you read the mail and will most likely send you more junk)
   2. BLIND COPY only (never use your e-mail program's "Forward" button for multiple e-mail).  Best if you just "cut-and-paste" the part of the message you want sent into a fresh "write" window and then blind copy.
   3. If you are attaching or embedding, virus check it before sending it.

3. If you have any questions about how to do any of the above, feel free to drop me a note at hvscnews@aol.com

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Last updated:   March 2, 2005

"As you know, I'm a big fan of NAV [Norton AntiVirus, now owned by Symantec Corporation ed]. Symantec also offers free cleaning tools for just about all of the common viruses. Problem is, you should really know exactly what you have so you can effectively get rid of it. To find out what you have, you, naturally, need some sort of antivirus program. I just thought I'd mention that even if someone uses another antivirus program, they can still go to Symantec and download the free cleaning tool for that particular virus. The most frequently needed cleaning tools are in the lower right corner of this link: http://www.symantec.com/avcenter/"    from Pete Gray, HVSC Membership Chairman 9/18/02

Most popular AntiVirus programs:

• Norton AntiVirus, from Symantec Corporation    (for Windows)
• McAfee Virus Scan Anti-Virus Software  (for Windows)  (trial version available)
• Dr. Solomon's Virex is now owned by McAfee (for Macintosh)

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"Coffee and Cats"

Some Spam-fighters use a three-character code to categorize the UCE (unsolicited commercial E-mail -- another term for Spam);  "C&C" is one I found amusing...

 If the post is particularly amusing (Spammer threat or a postmaster threat), put C&C in the subject.... it means Coffee and cats. This originated from a post claiming that a particular outrageous article had caused spewing of coffee into the keyboard and jumping while holding a cat, resulting in scratched thighs.

or as another source puts it...

"C&C" means "Coffee & Cats". It's a warning that you should remove from your vicinity all tasty beverages and furry felines, as the content of the message may cause you to convulse with laughter in a manner which will scare furry felines and can result in spilling of a tasty beverage over your keyboard (or alternatively choking on your beverage if you are drinking it when you start laughing).

Incidentally, that's what the "You owe me a new keyboard/monitor" statements allude to - someone forgetting to put the C&C warning on a funny message and endangering cats & computer equipment as a result.

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