Newsletter ArchiveSUBJECTs:E-mail Virus - No Guarantees The Internet 800 Directory - http://www.inter800.com The Internet 800 Directory Newsletter This issue is for Friday, April 26, 2002 Table of Contents 01. E-mail Virus 02. No Guarantees 03. Steve’s Tip Of The Week *01 E-mail Virus On April the 12th, I wrote in the newsletter that someone was using my e-mail address when sending out a virus. That someone was the virus W32.Klez. This virus picks an e-mail address at random from the address book of the infected computer to use in the “from field” when it does its mass mailing. This makes notifying the infected parties next to impossible, leaving the user ignorant and the infected machine sending out more contaminated e-mail. The subject and attachment name of incoming emails are randomly chosen and very creative. The attachment will have one of the following extensions: .bat, .exe, .pif or .scr. –DON’T OPEN THEM!--
This virus may include a program that will destroy all of your files on
the 13th of March and September.
The virus exploits a vulnerability in Microsoft Outlook and Outlook
Express, a vulnerability that can be corrected by installing the patch
found at
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/MS01-020.asp.
The email subject line that this virus sends is composed of "random"
strings. The subject can be one of the following:
Undeliverable mail--"[Random word]"Returned mail--"[Random word]" a [Random word] [Random word] game a [Random word] [Random word] tool a [Random word] [Random word] website a [Random word] [Random word] patch [Random word] removal tools how are you let's be friends darling so cool a flash,enjoy it your password honey some questions please try again welcome to my hometown the Garden of Eden introduction on ADSL meeting notice questionnaire congratulations sos! japanese girl VS playboy look,my beautiful girl friend eager to see you spice girls' vocal concert japanese lass' sexy pictures If you have patched your Outlook and are receiving a lot of subject only e-mails, you will most likely find the subject in the list above. On Monday alone we had over 300 infected e-mail send to our accounts, which means way too many people are still falling prey to these viruses. Please update you software and don’t open attachments. If you have any thought or ideas you would like to share with me, please send them to Chuck Arning at chuck@inter800.com We’re Talkin’ Serious” Bone Suckin’ Sauce ! Winner: “Battle Of The Sauces.” Created in true western North Carolina style. Tomato based all-natural, sweetened with honey and molasses. Order your Box of six today for $39.99 +s/h. Toll-Free 1-800-446-0947 or online http://www.BoneSuckin.com *02 No Guarantees A client and I were discussing his web site and he asked about improving his placement in the search engines. He had mentioned an offer he received that would "guarantee" top ten placement in (unnamed) search engines. Later that same day, I spoke with another client that was paying $29.95 per month for a search engine optimization package. While we've discussed things you should do to improve placement, we've never really talked about what you shouldn't do. I think it's time we did. First, if you have just launched your web site and it's not yet listed in the search engines, you will have to pay for inclusion in the more prominent engines (Yahoo, Looksmart, AltaVista, Excite, & others). Inclusion is merely the equivalent of what was once a free listing. It does not provide any covenants for special or preferred placement and depending on your key words, will most likely only send you those people specifically looking for your site. If a search engine optimization company is promising you placement in important engines, it is either charging you the inclusion fee (after marking it up), or ignoring it and thus not likely to get your site in these top engines. The list of "search engines" these services submit your site to often number in the hundreds of thousands. Most of these so-called "search engines" are actually free classifieds or free links pages that offer to display your web address on their site for free. The idea behind posting to these sites, even though most acknowledge they will never send any worthwhile traffic, is that links on these pages may count towards your site's link popularity and thus improve your site's placement within the important engines. Rubbish! Links on these sites don't stay up for very long and even if a search engine detects them, they are given no credibility. Engines such as Google evaluate the site the link resides on when determining relevance and these sites come up a big empty. Let's delve deeper into this "Free links" page concept and why you should avoid them. For the most part, these sites exist solely to collect your personal and/or business information for marketing purposes (SPAM!). I've run one of these campaigns at a client's request. Understanding how this works, I set up a free email address for him at Yahoo and listed it in his contact info. After 24 hrs., the email address had already received over 1250 unsolicited emails. Another 500+ arrived the next day and there were 250 more on Day 3. Most were offers for business opportunities, MLM's, and other entrepreneurial endeavors. Not surprisingly, there were also a good number of "search engine optimization" offers as well. Most of these offers also promise to resubmit your site monthly, weekly, or even more (for a recurring monthly fee). The problem is, continual resubmission to a search engine does not provide better results. Re-posting to the free links pages might return your site to a place of prominence on their page, but it will also reignite the spam process. In other words, this practice may sound good to the novice, but in reality, it accomplishes nothing positive. Here's another little trick some of these companies do. They charge you to build "doorway pages" to your site. The idea is, each doorway page is designed to be liked by the specific engine it is being submitted to. For example, after studying the sites returned in the top ten on AltaVista, they understand what AltaVista "likes" in a web page. Next, they build a web page that mimics the algorithms of the successful sites and submit that page to that search engine. These doorway pages then refer the searcher to your actual web site. The trick here is, these pages reside on their server. If they are somehow successful in getting these pages decent listings, those listings belong to them, not you. Your web site is not listed within these search engines at all. Thus, to continue the benefits these pages might bring, you have to continue to pay this company for their monthly service. There really is such a thing as search engine optimization, but it takes time, effort and money. Most importantly, it comes with no guarantees. The only way you can assure top placement in Yahoo's directory is to pay Yahoo. Companies that promise the moon for a relatively minor charge are simply taking advantage of your desire to improve your business. As with everything, "If it sounds too good to be true" that's probably what it is. If you are considering such a service and wish to have its validity verified, send me the offer and I'll investigate it for you. George Paul (http://gotollfree.com) The Internet 800 Directory 800-299-1879, george@gotollfree.com Vegas Vacation has the best rates on Las Vegas Hotel Rooms. Don't make a reservation without calling us first! Call 800-637-6442 or visit our ad in the Internet 800 Directory: http://inter800.com/02281174.htm Steve’s Tip Of The Week Many people that are new to computers and the Internet learn, after they plug-and-play, that the Copy and Paste functions are critical. However, most do not know of old MS Dos key functions that may be easier to use. To copy, left click with your mouse and while holding it down, drag over the text you want to copy as to highlight it. Then key in Ctrl+C, this copies the text. Move your mouse to where you want it copied and click in Ctrl+V. This pastes it. To cut the text out of a document, follow the procedure above but use Ctrl+X, then Ctrl+V to paste it. Steve Jackson saj@gotollfree.com Banners? Pay-per-click? Why not target your market with links or information placed in relevant content? The Internet 800 Directory Newsletter offers direct access to business people who are interested buyers. Advertising: Information on how to sponsor this publication: Call 800-299-1879 Thanks for taking to time to review our newsletter for this week. If you know of anyone that might benefit from receiving this newsletter, send them to (http://www.inter800.com/news800/ ) where they can subscribe. All Contents Copyright ©1995-2002 The Internet 800 Directory Subscribe To The Newsletter: |