Postcards

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Posted: Mon Nov 30, 2009 9:24 am

I'm getting a load of 'postcards' on my collection accounts, I never open them. What is the score, are they introductions/icebreakers, viruses or what?
Confused

S.K.

Master of Master Baiters Joined: 26 Sep 2008 Posts: 689

Hard to say ... BUT never ever open an attachment on a dodgy email unless you have a 100% risky free anti-virus scanner programme ... and that does not exist!

Posted: Tue Dec 01, 2009 4:04 am

Hard to say without an example. If it's got a questionable attachment, definitely don't answer it.

However, the lads will resort to anything to send their initial script out. A while ago I got a rash of "Soandso thinks you'll be interested in this website!" type emails, with their whole script cut and pasted into the "personal message" section. More recently, my catcher accounts have gotten a ton of Yahoo Schedule "invitations", again with the script pasted into the text box.

Perhaps these "postcards" are the same? An online postcard service, that the lads are abusing to spam their scripts?

Posted: Tue Dec 01, 2009 4:58 pm

Its not just postcards, but also lads seem to use the yahoo calender message, and other yahoo invites. Plus I have received attachments recently both in ms word(.doc) and plain text(.txt) format, containing their script.

Yes I know that opening such attachments are a no-no, and I don't run any kind of anti-virus software, but I open these types of mails anyways because for one, I am not running Windows while doing this (but rather Slackware Linux), and two I can still post the scams.

Hell even if some lads are feeling malicious enough to at least harm a victim's pc if they can't scam them, they wouldn't succeed with me ever. Kinda hard to hax a system when it is running as non-root under a NAT router not replying to any incoming ping requests, nor are there any open ports. Give it your best shot laddie! *sticks out tongue* *THTHTHPTHPTHPHTPHT!*

Baiting Guru Joined: 04 Jan 2006 Posts: 3193

There are viruses (actually trojans) that infect by pretending to be online greetings-cards.

Posted: Tue Dec 01, 2009 6:34 pm

I think I have seen those before. I got a few mails from "greetings.com" on my catcher account stating someone sent me a card.

Trophy Videos · Posted: Tue Dec 01, 2009 8:01 pm

I never open greeting cards. Thud is right, easy to hide trojans in them. I think they are usually phishers, or others trying to zombie your pc and turn it into a spamming machine or DDoS machine. You can't bait them in the usual sense. They just want to infect your pc, grab info, and control it. Maybe some standard 419ers are using them for script, but given past history, I avoid opening them like the plague. There are plenty of other lads to play with.

Posted: Thu Dec 03, 2009 7:41 pm

Just another note: It seems yahoo has a built in virus scanner, so each attachment that I do choose to open from a 419 email automatically gets checked on their end. *shrug*

Trophy Videos · Posted: Thu Dec 03, 2009 9:26 pm

One scan with one AV program is not a 100% risky-free indication that an attachment is clean. Scanners miss things, it might not have a definition written for it, or it could be an undetectable or unscanned for rootkit. Am I paranoid?
Sure, with reason, as I had to reformat my hard disc a few months ago, even though I have AV and antimalware running realtime. I'm still not positive whether it was an accidental opening of an email attachment, or visiting the wrong website.

Baiting Guru Joined: 19 Apr 2007 Posts: 3123

Machines are only as good as the people that programme them. It's always best to use your own caution rather than relying on a bit of software to be vigilant for you.

If it's starkingly obvious, I wouldn't think it's a good idea to "test" your AV. I see my AV there as a last line of defence, if something sneaks in that isn't so blatant.

Posted: Thu Dec 03, 2009 10:06 pm

True, and on my end I don't run a virus scanner. Do I really need a virus scanner for Linux? Wink