Nearly 200,000 infected e-mails were intercepted and deleted Thursday

3:05 p.m., Aug. 22, 2003--In the face of a series of virulent computer worm and virus attacks nationwide, IT is asking campus computer users to take precautions to help prevent widespread attacks on the UD network.

The viruses and worms—which have names like “Sobig.F” and “Blaster,” and come with a variety of e-mail subject lines like “Your details,” “Thank You,” “Your application” and “Wicked screensaver”—have caused some corporate e-mail systems to shut down.

The e-mail onslaught is symptomatic of a number of computer viruses that have appeared across the country in recent weeks.

“We are getting a number of calls from users who have received messages from the most recent virus,” Kathy Beardsley, manager of UD’s IT Help Center, said. Beardsley emphasized, however, that IT disinfects any message with a known virus before delivering it.

“Because nearly 200,000 messages with SoBig were received Thursday afternoon, Aug. 21, all messages with SoBig are now being dropped instead of being disinfected and delivered,” Beardsley said. “This has reduced the number of messages to come to campus e-mail users that began `A known virus was discovered and deleted from an attachment….’”

Some users are still receiving “undeliverable mail” messages for e-mail they did not send. Individuals who receive such messages on the UD computing network are not in jeopardy, Beardsley said. She advised just deleting the messages as they appear.

The IT Help Center also advises UD faculty, staff and students to be sure their computer’s McAfee antivirus software is up to date by visiting [www.udel.edu/topics/virus/mcafee/] and that they have performed all critical operating system updates by visiting [www.udel.edu/security/secms.html].

New and returning students also are being told to secure their systems BEFORE connecting them to the network when they arrive on campus because infected systems will be disconnected from the network. For more information, go to [www.udel.edu/help/2003studletter.html].

For more information on system updates, click [www.udel.edu/PR/UDaily/2004/windows080103.html].

Article by Jerry Rhodes

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