I. Advise

1. Do not sent it out to other people! Sending it out will just cause more trouble. E-mails today use HTML formatting. all it takes is three lines of code and you will have a virus Do not click on any links. It is possible for the link to say one thing and do something different. You want to type this link into your browser.
2. Check to see if the threat is real. During the spread of the Olympic Torch Virus, I simply went to Mcafee.com and did a search for "Invitation", which the e-mail stated as the attachment, and I immediately found the info about the hoax. Please note how all links that I have on my site that lead to other sites will say where they are going so that you can type them into the address bar.
3. If it is fake, delete it. Do not spread it around.
4. Update your virus scan.
5. Scan your computer for viruses. E-mails that may look like they are going to help you can actually have viruses
6. If it is real, tell your friends, but not in an e-mail. If you do send an e-mail with the alert, spam filters may junk your e-mail. If you do need to tell your friends using e-mail, write a new e-mail. Do not forward the exsisting one.

II. Virus Scans

• Avast: http://www.avast.com/eng/avast_4_home.html
  • Free
• Symantec: http://www.symantec.com/home_homeoffice/products/index.html
  • Does virus scans, firewalls, and spyware scans (if I am correct). Does cost money
• McAfee: http://us.mcafee.com/?wt.mc.n=us_us_learnmore_home&wt.mc_t=int_pro_hom&cid=10348
  • Good scan company, offers free scanners for severe viruses. Normal scan program does cost money.

III. Firewall

• ZoneLabs: http://www.zonelabs.com/store/content/catalog/products/sku_list_za.jsp?dc=12bms&ctry=US&lang=en&lid=dbtopnav_zass
• This is free and what I use, but there are other versions of ZoneLabs Firewall, which cost money, but can scan for viruses and spyware.
• Shields UP!: https://www.grc.com/x/ne.dll?bh0bkyd2
• This is not a firewall; however, I am putting this in the firewall section because Shields Up will scan your ports to see if they are open, closed, or stealth (which is the best mode)

IV. Spyware Scans

• Microsoft: http://www.microsoft.com/athome/security/spyware/software/default.mspx
  • Good scaning program, the one I use for real time scanning. Free, but still in a testing stage, and for XP SP2 only.
• Spybot Search and Destroy: http://www.safer-networking.org/en/spybotsd/index.html
  • Just as good, and free
• Lavasoft http://www.lavasoftusa.com/
  • Free

Please note that you should only one virus scan and one firewall as multiples of any can cause problems. You can, and should, however, use multiple spyware scanners on one computer.

From the guy with his eye on the sky: Travis