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Tampa Bay Computer
Society Bulletin

9/14/2003

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Contents

1) Current Viruses

2) TBCS Classes

3) SIG Stuff

4) Educational Opportunities

5) ASK a Librarian - New, Free Service!
     "Help is just a mouse click away"

Maps to our Resource Center & General Meeting:
http://tampa-bay.org/maps.htm

1) Current Viruses

Once again, I have to write about viruses (the proper word is "virii", but that just sounds silly to me).  I  need to write about them because I (and several of my colleagues) have spent the last 2 weeks removing so many from a variety of computers.  EVERY single one of those computers was running either Norton or McAfee anti-virus programs.

The latest breed of viruses (worms actually) exploit a security vulnerability that occurs in the Window's Remote Procedure Call (RPC) function.  There are several viruses that exploit this vulnerability (the most notorious is Blaster).  If your computer has spontaneously rebooted within the last 3 or 4 weeks, you are probably infected.  Microsoft released a free patch several weeks ago that would have protected you, but many users did not install it.  These particular viruses do NOT attack Win95, Win98, Win98SE, or WinME, however I suggest users of those machines consider what I'm about to write below.

In my opinion, your first line of defense in the virus war is to ensure that you have applied all service packs and critical updates to your particular flavor of Windows.  Notice the use of the word "critical" in the previous sentence.  If you look up critical in a Thesaurus, you might see some of the following words: crucial, significant, urgent, vital.  Have I made my point?

I, like a lot of others, used to approach Window's updates in the following fashion: if I didn't hear anyone complaining about them after a few days, then I went ahead and installed them.  I've since become a convert.  Now I install them immediately.  I'm not taking any more chances.  I think it's become riskier to wait.  I think that Norton & McAfee are your 2nd line of defense, not your first.

I strongly encourage you to drop by Windows Update:
http://windowsupdate.microsoft.com/ and click on "Scan for Updates" in order to see what updates you are missing.  You may have to do this multiple times (you might not be able to install all of them at once), and you may have to restart your computer each time you install something.  Please bring your computer up-to-date.

Here's some steps that I urge you to take:

1. Use a firewall.  If you're running WinXP, a firewall is built into the product.  Norton & McAfee also make firewalls.  My favorite firewall is ZoneAlarm (www.zonealarm.com)
2. Make sure your anti-virus software is properly updated.  You might want to use my favorite, free, online virus scan: HouseCall: http://housecall.antivirus.com/.
   What has happened in many cases is that Norton & McAfee have themselves become infected.  Using HouseCall will ensure that they haven't joined the Dark Side.
3. You might want to scan a webpage on Microsoft's site called:
   What You Should Know About the Blaster Worm and Its Variants: http://www.microsoft.com/security/incident/.
   This page provides a good overview of what you need to know in order to combat today's viruses.

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2) TBCS Classes

Howard Poindexter is readying the curriculum for his brand spankin' new Basic Paint Shop Pro class on September 24th & 25th from 2pm to 4pm each day (that's a Wednesday & Thursday afternoon).  That's a total of 4 hours of instruction, and will cost $20.  Paint Shop Pro is a very powerful graphics program that is several hundred dollars less costly than Photoshop.

Jan Norman is registering people for her Windows 101 class in October.  You better sign up pronto because this class is already half full.  Please contact her at: tbcs.office@verizon.net.

If you're interested in a basic word processing class, please contact Dennis Schulman at
dschulman@myrapidsys.com.

You can see our current classroom schedule and register online by surfing over to: http://tampa-bay.org/classroom.htm.

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3) SIG Stuff

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5) ASK a Librarian - New, Free Service!
     "Help is just a mouse click away"

ASK a Librarian  is a brand new service that permits you to chat live, one-on-one with a librarian.  The service is free, very easy to use, and available from 10:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m. EST, Monday through Friday (hours will be expanding over the next few months).

Click on the above link and then click the "Chat" button and a real person will answer you.  Now here's a really cool feature: let's say that you ask a question about cars.  Let's say that the librarian finds a website that has more extensive information of interest for you.  They can send YOUR browser to that page for you.  No asking you to cut & paste or write anything down, they just make it happen.

I saw one "gotcha" in this process.  If you are running a pop-up blocker, it will keep you from accessing the service, but you might not be given any cues that your blocker is causing the problem.  Most blockers I've seen will let you override them temporarily (probably by holding down the Ctrl key).  Enjoy

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See you at the Largo Cultural Center,

Doc (Dave Dockery)
Director of Education for TBCS

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