Stopping an E-mail Virus???

[Martoch]

Hey guys, I was just presented with this question today and I couldn't give an honest answer, so I lied.


No really, I'm curious to know if this will work as an anti-email virus solution...

HOW TO PROTECT YOUR ADDRESS BOOK FROM A VIRUS!

This trick won't keep the virus from getting into your computer; but it will stop it from using your address book to spread further, and it will alert you to the fact that the worm has gotten into your system.

Here's what you do:

First, open your address book and click on "new contact," just as you would do if you were adding a new friend to your list of e-mail addresses. In the window where you would type your friend's first name, type in AAAAAAA. Same in space labeled screen name. Now, here's what you've done and why it works:

The "name" AAAAAAA will be placed at the top of your address book as entry #1. This will be where the worm will start in an effort to send itself to all your friends. But, when it tries to send itself to AAAAAAA, it will be undeliverable because of the phony email address you entered. If the first attempt fails (which it will because of the phony address), the worm goes no further and your friends will not be infected.

Here's the second great advantage of this method:
If an email cannot be delivered, you will be notified of this in your
Inbox almost immediately. Hence, if you ever get an e-mail telling you that an e-mail addressed to AAA could not be delivered, you know right away that you have the worm virus in your system. You can then take steps to get rid of it!


Any thoughts on this?

Thanks!
Mike

[elroy]

Yes it would notify you of a virus present in your system, but I'm not sure you would find out prior to it going out to other people.
I remember seeing a similar version of this idea, but it said to use your own address for the AAAAAAA entry.

[Martoch]

Yeah that's pretty much my question, would the 'AAAAAA' address cause the virus to stop in it's tracks or would it just go on down the list??? I've never had to deal with an e-mail virus so I'm not familiar.

[Martoch]

[cowboybooter]

I have heard something similar, but in the e-mail address line the options were either something undeliverable, your own e-mail address, or the tech support address of Symantec !

I can't speak from personal, as I have never had an e-mail virus, this could be because I have fully updated NAV 2K3 and Personal Firewall running, also because everyone in my house is on Yahoo, so address book not easy to access.


CBB