Outlook Spam Guard
According to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), the nation’s consumer protection agency, some fraud artists are taking advantage of the disaster to rip-off people who want to help victims or who are looking for news about the hurricane. A good Outlook spam guard can be of great help however.
Katrina News Spam
Some computer hackers are pasting a snippet of news about the hurricane into an email, with a link to “read more.” Without an Outlook spam filter or free Outlook Express spam blocker and if you click on the link, you may be unwittingly starting a process that secretly installs software giving the hackers control over your computer. It’s called “spyware,” and it allows the hacker to access the data and programs on your computer, or even take control over computers and use them to send spam.
Computer security experts and federal officials say consumers should not click on links in, or reply to, unsolicited email offering news about Hurricane Katrina or asking for donations to help the victims. And they caution consumers not to cut and paste any links from an unsolicited email message into their own Internet browsers. Scammers can make links look like they go to one place, but send computer users to a different site and some anti-spam software for Outlook and anti spam programs for outlook express can detect these differences.
How can you detect spyware on your computer? Your computer may suddenly take a long time to run the programs you use; you may get random error messages; or you may find new and unexpected icons or toolbars on your screen.
How can you get rid of it? Security experts recommend you to take three steps:
For information about the hurricane, visit a government website or a news website that you know. Government websites have a “.gov” address. Always remember to have good anti-spam software for Outlook or Outlook spam guard as well.
