This nifty trick could stop a virus that slips past your antivirus software

A bounce of prevention

by Michael Bray   With the ever-increasing inventory of viruses that grab the address book from e-mail applications and send the virus to all your contacts, I’ve frequently recommended to friends that they add their own e-mail address to their address book. That way they would know if their computer is sending out a virus. But here’s an idea that’s even better.

Create two new contacts in your e-mail address book: one with the name !0000 and another named ZZZ. Do not put actual e-mail addresses in the e-mail address field. The !0000 contact will then show up as your first contact; the ZZZ will be last. If a virus hits you and attempts to send its malicious payload to everyone on your contact list, your PC will put up an error message saying something along the following lines: "The Message could not be sent. One or more recipients do not have an e-mail address. Please check your Address Book and make sure all the recipients have a valid e-mail address." (The ZZZ contact is for viruses that start at the bottom of your address book, while !0000 takes care of those that start at the top.) In effect, your computer doesn’t send the message because of the bogus entry in your contact list.

This tip won’t work on a virus that picks e-mail addresses at random. It only works on those that attempt to grab the whole e-mail list. Also, various e-mail applications may respond in different ways.

While this trick might save you and your friends some grief, it does not reduce your need for an antivirus program and frequent virus-definition updates.

Michael Bray, ABR, CSP, eCertified, (bray@elpasotx.com) is president of the Greater El Paso Association of REALTORS® and a member of the TAR Technology Task Force.

Illustration © Digital Vision.

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