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Emily The upgrade normally should have located the old address book file and used it if it was there. Yes it is possible as people play with the locations and names of their data files that the upgrade could not find it. This is where backing up your data files in a off computer location ie floppy or zip drives or burn to a cd becomes very important as then you will not loose critical and important data. I am not trying to be an alarmist but reality is that the viruses are getting quite sophisticated out there now and can if designed so wipe out any address book data file in a few seconds after mailing out viruses to everyone on it. Some of the recent viruses can actually disable your virus checking software and delete some of its files making virus checking software unusable. The blank or fake address name in position 1 worked about 2- 3 years ago on a specific virus and still does for this specific type of virus, however today the viruses don't care and are unaffected by fake or dummy addresses in any place in your address book. They can also randomize send dates and can randomize who they will send the virus to. Let me briefly quote from our latest virus tech bulletin as to how sophisticated these have become. This is from the latest KLEZ virus. "The author has changed enough of the bits to get past most virus programs," "In many circumstances, the worm doesn't need the victim to open it in order to run. Instead, it takes advantage of a 12-month-old vulnerability in Microsoft Outlook, known as the Automatic Execution of Embedded MIME Type bug, to open itself automatically on unpatched versions of Outlook." NOTE: This is Outlook not Outlook Express. A comment here is that anyone may have an old unused version of Outlook sitting on their computer which will facilitate and make this virus thrive without your knowledge at all. I would recommend that if you DON'T use Outlook which is installed by Microsoft Office or was the standard Windows email program installed a few years ago; to uninstall it or use Windows - remove programs to remove it from the hard drive. IF you are using Outlook then please ensure all the latest security updates have been installed. "The program will also cull e-mail addresses by searching a host of different file types on the infected PC. Using its own mail program, the worm will send itself off to those e-mail addresses. In addition, it will use the addresses to create a fake "From:" field in the e-mail message, disguising the actual source of the e-mail. Finally, the worm attempts to disable antivirus software by deleting registry keys, stopping running processes and removing virus-definition files." The AntiVirus software makers have updated their software so the virus cannot disable them and have updated their antivirus software to identify and remove the virus. Thats why it is so important not only to ensure everyone's virus definitions and virus checkers are up to date but that ALL the security patches for browsers and email software issued by Microsoft be downloaded, updated and installed when they are released! Don On Monday, May 6, 2002, at 07:40 AM, Emily and Julian Brinac wrote: > Lavanya, > Will see what the experts say about. this. When I updated my Internet > Explorer and Outlook Express got update, my address stored and the > address book did not get deleted. Is it possible though that the > addresses were hidden and they were not actually deleted? May we get > HELP out there! > Emily > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "vmehra" <[log in to unmask]> > To: <[log in to unmask]> > Sent: Monday, May 06, 2002 8:19 AM > Subject: Address Book Protection > > >> Hello, >> Well that wasn't quite the way my Virus worked. I had just downloaded > the >> laterst version of Internet Explorer and there all the Outlook Express > files >> got updated too. All the addresses stored in the address book got > deleted. >> But when the virus hit the computer, my address book being empty didnt >> matter. Viruses as I have learnt now may just at random hit different > mails >> and sites. >> take care >> Lavanya >> >> ---------------------------------------------------------------------- >> To sign-off Parkinsn send a message to: > mailto:[log in to unmask] >> In the body of the message put: signoff parkinsn > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > To sign-off Parkinsn send a message to: > mailto:[log in to unmask] > In the body of the message put: signoff parkinsn > > -- DWD Computer Services Box 219 Erickson, Mb. R0J 0P0 1 204 636 2206 www.erickson-mb.com/dwd --where customer needs come first-- ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To sign-off Parkinsn send a message to: mailto:[log in to unmask] In the body of the message put: signoff parkinsn