Not what you want to hear from your listparents

[redbird]

We just got the following on the copyediting-l mailing list:

Jane is currently communicating with the IU list manager. We have
received a bounced message from another LIST that claims to have been
submitted to the list by CE-L.

It is likely that multiple subscribers' computers are now infected. In
a situation like this, the list manager might decide that the best
option is to shut down all lists. This is pure speculation on my part.

If CE-L suddenly disappears, you'll at least have been forewarned.

Run that anti-virus software, please.

Comments

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

Someone is claiming you got a virus in ASCII e-mail? Or does this list allow attachments?

K. [skeptical, and a list mom from way back]

[redbird]

Nobody's claiming I got a virus, in email or at all.

What seems to be happening is that someone, or possibly a couple of someones, sent a virus to the list (lots of people have the list address in their address books), and now a second list claims to have gotten it from our list.

The list has over a thousand subscribers (many of whom don't post, or post once in a blue moon), which means over a thousand people who could have sent it a virus.

It doesn't help that we had someone respond with the hoary and ineffectual suggestion of putting a bogus !10000 at the top of one's address book.

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

If this second list got a message from copyediting that the second list claims had a virus with it, I assume you got this same allegedly infected message? Or is the second list claiming that it received mail from copyediting that you didn't also receive?

Did the message in question have an attachment? Does copyediting allow attachments? The only virus I ever heard of that could be transmitted in plain ASCII was the ViRo .signature virus, and it cannot self-replicate.

This smells like hysterical and misinformed people freaking out for no reason (assuming the list does not permit attachments, as shouldn't).

K. [why people continue to use programs like Outlook is completely beyond me]m

[redbird]

I suspect someone has made a mistake. But I don't think it's Bill or Jane (our listparents). One thing that seems to be going on is that Klez fakes its "from" semi-randomly; it's possible that someone on both lists got a virus actually from an individual subscriber that claimed to be from CE-L.

klez

[(Anonymous)]

yes, this Klez virus is a bugger! I've seen infected mail purportedly from several lists.

Anita Rowland (http://www.anitarowland.com/)

update

[redbird]

Turns out that there was never any danger of losing the list permanently; the possibility (now remote) is that the university that hosts us may shut down its listserv for a little while to sort things out and, they hope, clean up.

So far, so good.