How viruses use spoofing to spread themselves to unsuspecting e-mail users

The past several weeks have probably been the worst ever for virus activity. As you have seen in the news reports, businesses, government agencies and organizations of all sizes have been extremely hampered by these new viruses, including Netsky, Beagle, and My Doom.

Several people have contacted me to let me know that someone using archdiocesan accounts are sending them viruses. I can say with relative certainty that this is not the case. The latest viruses all use a technique called ‘spoofing.’ The viruses find an e-mail account in the infected computer's address book to send to, but then they also select a second address to spoof as the supposed sender. The recipient of the virus and the ‘archmil’ account user must have a common friend who is the one who actually has the virus and has both of their names in their address book.

More information about these particular viruses is given at the Symantec site at http://www.symantec.com/avcenter. If you scroll down to “Top Virus Threats” there are links to information on each virus and instructions on how to remove them if your computer becomes infected.

Click on the ‘Download PDF’ icon to view an illustration detailing how virus are spread through a technique called “spoofing.”

Mark Barthel, Webmaster
Archdiocese of Milwaukee