# Please (don't) forward this to everyone in your mailing list



## DonaldG (Aug 23, 2007)

How often have you received an email purporting to contain some form of vital information that is of great importance to everyone? They contain imperatives that make you feel like a criminal if you don't comply...

It may contain a warning about a new virus in an attachment ... Or it may be a 'good luck' message saying that your luck will be bad if you do not forward it etc....

I get this sort of email several times a week. Without exception, I ignore and dump them. Why?

They are a form of 'Multi Mailer' virus. The only difference between a MM Virus and this type is that a MM virus is a *self replicating* one that *automatically* emails itself to everyone on your address book. This one is a *manual replication and distribution* one. I relies on you to do the dastardly deed!

Consider the consequences of sending it out to everyone in your mail list:

I have over 514 names & addresses in my address book. That may be exceptional so let us use a nice easy number of say 50 addresses as an average & every one complies. The numbers become staggering...

Let us assume the average response time for each iteration is 24 hours

1 - Monday: a person sends it to 50 people.
2 - Tuesday: they each send it to another 50 people (50 x 50 = 2500)
3 - Wednesday: 2500 x 50 = 125,000 emails
4 - Thursday: 125,000 x 50 = 6,250,000 emails
5 - Friday: 6,250,000 x 50 = 31,2500,000 mails
6 - Saturday: 31,2500,000 x 50 = 15,625,000,000 emails

...And that is why I implore you to ignore the email and just bin it. *Don't contribute* to clogging up Internet with more worthless stuff that is the major cause of the slowness of the 'net!

(As a point of interest, the world population is only approximately 6,792,292,216)


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## -WOLF- (Jan 17, 2009)

I always assumed very specific things such as virus outbreaks on popular websites type emails that are usually claimed by Norton or some other popular company, are legitamate. I never do forward any chain mail I recieve but I do sometimes look at it.

It's scary to know how fast this stuff can spread. The scarier thing is that there are so many people who forward this stuff (most notable: everyone's mother, mine included, they seem to feel obliged to send the stuff)


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## jcgriff2 (Sep 30, 2007)

They used to be delivered to your house by the United States Postal Service on horseback.


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## Done_Fishin (Oct 10, 2006)

I agree wholeheartedly with Don ..

Firstly .. if there is a major alert via some AV software house it won't come around looking like the message that one receives, 

Secondly, these messages look more or less the same .. once you have seen one you have seen them all ..

Thirdly ... Most AV sites have somewhere that you can go and check to see if it's a hoax .. 

Fourthly .. there is always SNOPES .. Google *Snopes* and the basic info you are seeing about the virus .. you'll get a good indication as to whether it's a hoax or not!!

last but not least, once you have verified the hoax you could copy/paste the info and send it ""REPLY TO ALL"" from whence it came, whilst advising same that they can or should check details before sending out said "hoax info" to everyone .. make sure you do it diplomatically if you value your friendship with the perpetrator :laugh:


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## DonaldG (Aug 23, 2007)

Done_Fishin said:


> last but not least, once you have verified the hoax you could copy/paste the info and send it ""REPLY TO ALL"" from whence it came, whilst advising same that they can or should check details before sending out said "hoax info" to everyone .. make sure you do it diplomatically if you value your friendship with the perpetrator :laugh:


I have often wanted to do that, but thinking on it, it is doing the same thing as replicating and perpetuating the thing but with a different message content.

In my eyes, the best thing is to bin it and hope that it will die a natural death.


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## Done_Fishin (Oct 10, 2006)

I have only done it once or twice .. mainly when someone has irritated me with more than one of these messages! You have to remember that, by sending a copy to everyone that has received the message, the sender gets a lot of egg on his face. They'll probably never talk to you again either :laugh:


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## deleted122510 (Mar 18, 2009)

I wish I got this thread at least a tiny bit - - - What are you talking about?


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## koala (Mar 27, 2005)

TJ, it's simple. If you get an unsolicited email that appears to contain important information and tells you to forward it to your friends, delete it and don't reply to the sender.


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## Done_Fishin (Oct 10, 2006)

Snopes is a great place to educate yourself about true/false hoaxes that are delivered by e-mail.

This is but one link that holds a template for messages of which content varies according to current trends.

http://www.snopes.com/computer/virus/postcard.asp

the general message that arrives is similar (on many occasions word for word and only with current scam headings changed) to this .. the same format is still running around today.



> > *Get this E-mail message sent around to your contacts ASAP. PLEASE FORWARD THIS WARNING AMONG FRIENDS, FAMILY AND CONTACTS! You should be alert during the next few days. Do not open any message with an attachment entitled 'Invitation' OR ONE CALLED 'POSTCARD,' Regardless of who sent it to you. It is a virus which opens an Olympic Torch OR A POSTCARD IMAGE, which 'burns' the whole hard disc C of your computer. This virus will be received from someone Who has your e-mail address in his/her contact list. This is the reason why you need to send this e-mail to all your contacts. It is better to receive this message 25 times than to receive the virus and open it.
> >
> > If you receive a mail called 'Invitation' even though sent to you by a friend, do not open it. Shut down your computer immediately. This is the worst virus announced by CNN. It has been classified by Microsoft as the most destructive virus ever. This virus was discovered by McAfee yesterday, and there is no repair yet for This kind of virus. This virus simply destroys the Zero Sector of the Hard Disc, where the vital information is kept.
> >
> ...


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## sandman55 (May 28, 2005)

When I get an email from a friend warning me of a virus that will burn my hard drive and such, I go to snopes and get the good info then I send the snopes link back to the friend as a form of education and ask the friend to forward it on to the person who sent it and ask for it to keep going back. It may be duplicating the clogging but I like to think it will help to educate them so that they will investigate before sending this rubbish out.


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## -WOLF- (Jan 17, 2009)

Wow I've heard of Snoopes but I never thought it could be used to identify fake emails and such.


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## sandman55 (May 28, 2005)

It's Snopes with one O very handy :sayyes:
http://www.snopes.com/


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## -WOLF- (Jan 17, 2009)

very interesting site


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