Warning: Virus in random IM pop-ups!

[Queen Asuka]

[COLOR=HOTPINK][SIZE=1]Like an idiot, I clicked on a link when I friend IMed me and it said, "This can't be true!" and then there was a link. DON'T CLICK THAT LINK IF YOU GOT IT FROM ME!!!! It was a virus, and when I clicked it, it sent the same message to everyone on my AIM and MSN lists. So if you got that random message from me, click it off. If you did click on the link, I suggest you run a virus scan immediately.[/coLOR][/SIZE]

[Corey]

[size=1]I got one from a friend too. I'm lucky enough to be on a Mac.
But he said it's one hell of a pain in the *** to stop.[/size]

[Whiteblaze]

This doesn't seem as if it's suppose to lead to any discussion, but I'll go ahead and tell of this slightly related occurrence of mine concerning weird IM happenings.

I'm sure someone has maybe seen this happen before. But anyhow a net friend of mine invited me into a conversation herself and this thing... you could call it many names. Before she did that she told me that it was a computer she was chatting with and I explained to her that it isn't possible for a computer to chat with people. But she just insisted that she wasn't talking to a real person, but again some sort of computer, virus or both. She told me some other person brought "it", she guessed, along with them when he IMed her. After a while he left and that's when I came in.

After about 15 seconds of her chatting with it I'm convinced it wasn't a real person because it was its messages came much too quickly and after 30 more seconds I noticed it asked way too many questions as if trying to dig out info about her or something and also stalling for time.

She proceeds to chat with it by toying around and playing with it I guess as she's like that and I tell her it's just some virus or something that's probably hacking our computers or something and that she should leave the conversation. But she decided to play some more and got it to tell where it came from and who/what sent it out and made it. Not exactly what it was though.

Anyway, I thought the whole thing was kind of strange because I never thought I'd come across something like it in an IM conv. Luckily what ever it was, that the little 13-year-old who brought it along with him, didn't cause any harm to either my friend's or my computer. And even if it had done something, the poor thing didn?t know any better because he clearly thought talking to something that wasn?t alive was extremely amusing to the point of calling it his friend. ^^;;

[DeadSeraphim]

[COLOR=Indigo][SIZE=1][FONT=Arial]You probably talked to SmarterChild, or the SantaClaus. They're both bots run by AIM for lonely people to talk to. I've seen some people manipulate it into saying some pretty horrible and deranged things, lol. I'm not naming any names, but they start with 'M' and rhyme with '*****'. XP[/FONT][/SIZE][/COLOR]

[Fall]

I use MSN Messenger.

I got a virus-scanner that is especially for use with MSN Messenger.

So, I'm safe. :smoke:

I hate those e-mail attachment viruses, though. I've got about 500 in the last week. :nope: Takes up half my inbox space, and for some reason, I can't delete them. Dunno why.

[Semjaza]

This comes up every few months. The smart thing to do would be to make sure where the link goes (if you hover the mouse pointer over the link it gives you the real URL) and not go to it unless it seems familiar. That or just ask the person what the hell it is. If they don't know, then obviously it's some other issue.

These things aren't that hard to remove, so I don't know why they're so prevalent. Of course, something like 80% of internet users don't even have a virus scanner.

[url]http://www.jayloden.com/aimfix.htm[/url] - This would probably help.

[Whiteblaze]

[quote name='Aiyisha][COLOR=Indigo][SIZE=1][FONT=Arial]You probably talked to SmarterChild, or the SantaClaus. They're both bots run by AIM for lonely people to talk to. I've seen some people manipulate it into saying some pretty horrible and deranged things, lol. I'm not naming any names, but they start with 'M' and rhyme with '*****'. XP[/FONT][/SIZE'][/COLOR][/quote]

I wouldn't think so because I use MSN, but maybe it was something similar. Who knows...

Lonely people, eh? Well, I would hope someone 'lonely' could be creative enough to find something more comforting than trying to have fun communicating with some bot with terrible AI. Otherwise that's just getting quite a bit on the sad side.

On the subject of viruses, I've never actually come across one that I clearly saw was a virus; perhaps due to efficient anti-virus software? So I don't really know specifically what viruses can do, but I have heard of this type that can wipe out your entire hard drive.

[QUOTE=Fall]I use MSN Messenger.

I got a virus-scanner that is especially for use with MSN Messenger.

So, I'm safe. :smoke:

I hate those e-mail attachment viruses, though. I've got about 500 in the last week. :nope: Takes up half my inbox space, and for some reason, I can't delete them. Dunno why.[/QUOTE]

Being the curious person I am, I ask what type of email do you use?

[Raiha]

[COLOR=MediumTurquoise]E-mail? I am the divine slave of Microsoft Entourage. But I'm on a Mac. Don't ask me to explain how that works, but the point is, I wasn't affected by any sort of virus. The blistering irony though, is that poor Queen Asuka's newly acquired virus sent me about ten IMs with ten links.

I closed all of them down, but out of curiosity clicked one, just to see if my computer could read it for a change. It couldn't, cause it was a .exe file. The poitn is, I love my iMac. It's so sexy!

The weird thing is lately I've been getting IMs from the aol team saying to send an
IM back to them with the number "1" to log me out of my sn which is somehow...logged in from another location? Weird.[/COLOR]

[outlawstar69]

[QUOTE=Neuvoxraiha][COLOR=MediumTurquoise]
The weird thing is lately I've been getting IMs from the aol team saying to send an
IM back to them with the number "1" to log me out of my sn which is somehow...logged in from another location? Weird.[/COLOR][/QUOTE]

I've gotten those before - usually they come up when either aim gets a stroke and I have to shut it down with task manager, and log in again, or it comes up when I log out and log in too fast. I don't think that has anything to do with a virus though, and probably something to do with IP addresses.

[Semjaza]

Yeah, those are somewhat normal and don't involve a virus or anything. I'd not worry about them too much... unless you suddenly get kicked off of AIM and get a message like that. It is possible that you logged on under that name at another location (school? a friend's?) and someone is trying to sign on as you, though.

If you get them a lot, I'd try changing your password. It shouldn't happen very often.