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On Thu, 2017-09-14 at 12:10 +0100, Neil wrote:
> Yesterday evening I happened to catch part of a TV program that I don't
> normally watch, Rip-Off Britain. This particular section had the story
> of a woman who got caught out through an email.
>
> She received an email which she did not recognise. After some hesitation
> she opened it, realised it was not for her and closed it down. She
> thought nothing more about it until the following morning when she saw
> the usual demand for money on her computer screen.
>
> To finish the story, she did not pay, but found some company which
> specialises in sorting out these problems. In the end she got back
> almost all of her personal files. (Back up? What's that?).
>
I caught part of this as I was leaving for work. The bit that got me was that
she ran her business accounts on the PC as well. So why no backup? If her disk
genuinely failed beyond use, she would still have lost her accounts.
> This got me thinking. Up to now I have thought that any email containing
> malware would not cause any trouble unless you actually clicked on an
> attachment. Just opening the email was safe. Obviously I was wrong.
>
The problem came to light many years ago when Microsoft would have their client
'automatically' open an email for you (i.e. a preview). This in turn could
infect the device (as someone else mentioned just opening the message can cause
something to run). I remember others here had to reconfigure MS clients not to
show a preview because of the problems.
John.
--
John Horne | Senior Operations Analyst | Technology and Information Services
University of Plymouth | Drake Circus | Plymouth | Devon | PL4 8AA | UK
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