Everyone
Please read and digest the following about the "Card For You" Hoax Virus
Knew You'd Pleased.....
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Virtual Card For You
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First Published February, 2001
Updated September, 2002
This is a complete hoax. There is no virus with the heading "A Virtual Card for You" or "A Card For You". Nearly all the anti-virus sites who alert people to hoaxes have this one listed as a hoax. The tip off here is the reference to Microsoft. The Microsoft Corporation does not make announcements, classify, or in anyway keep track of viruses. They do internally respond to security holes in their browser and e-mail program (Outlook) to help make infection through these programs more difficult, but they are not in the antivirus business.
There was no panic in New York or anywhere else. And again, no virus can "permanently destroys a hard drive" or any other hardware device. Viruses are just computer programs and the affect data only, not hardware. Even if a virus could destroy the FAT (file allocation table) stored in the zero sector of your hard drive, a second copy is stored on your hard drive and your computer would access that one if the first was not found.
Just dump this one and tell the person who sent it to you let everyone know this is a total fabrication.
See the following resources:
F-Secure Virtual Card for You Hoax
About.Com: AntiVirus Site: Virtual Card for You Hoax
This is the latest hoax letter, as of September 2002:
Subject: WORST VIRUS EVER...CNN ANNOUNCED
PLEASE SEND THIS TO EVERYONE ON YOUR CONTACT LIST !!
A new virus has just been discovered that has been classified by
Microsoft as the most destructive ever! This virus was discovered yesterday
afternoon by McAfee and no vaccine has yet! been developed. This virus
simply destroys Sector Zero from the hard disk, where vital information for
its functioning are stored.
This virus acts in the following manner: It sends itself automatically to
all contacts on your list with the title "A Card for You."
As soon as the supposed virtual card is opened, the computer freezes so that
the user has to reboot. When the ctrl+alt+del keys or the reset button are
pressed, the virus destroys Sector Zero, thus permanently destroying the
hard disk. Yesterday in just a few hours this virus caused panic in New
York, according to news broadcast by CNN. This alert was received by an
employee of Microsoft itself.
So don't open any mails with subject: "A Virtual Card for You."
As soon as you get the mail, delete it!! Even if you know the sender!!!
Please pass this mail to all of your friends.
Forward this to everyone in your address book. I'm sure most people, like
myself, would rather receive this 25 times than not at all.
Here was the first e-mail hoax letter to circulate:
Subject: A new virus has just been discovered that has been classified by Microsoft (
www.microsoft.com ) and by McAfee (
www.mcafee.com ) as the most destructive ever!
This virus was discovered yesterday afternoon by McAfee and no vaccine has yet been developed. This virus simply destroys Sector Zero from the hard disk, where vital information for its functioning are stored. This virus acts in the following manner:
It sends itself automatically to all contacts on your list with the title "A Virtual Card for You". As soon as the supposed virtual card is opened, the computer freezes so that the user has to reboot. When the ctrl+alt+del keys or the reset button are pressed, the virus destroys Sector Zero, thus permanently destroying the hard disk. Yesterday in just a few hours this virus caused panic in New York, according to news broadcast by CNN (
www.cnn.com ).
This alert was received by an employee of Microsoft itself. So don't open any mails with subject "A Virtual Card for You". As soon as you get the mail, delete it.
Please pass on this mail to all your friends.