I'm going to add this as a blog post as soon as the server is available again so don't send anyone to my blog now just copy form the bulletin:
Viruses have been added to people's pictures that they have uploaded to myspace. It's not all the pictures and is not all accounts. But, if you have lost your control of your email account you want to do this for sure. I regained my email account this morning after getting a bulletin and following the instructions.
This may also be a means of entry to create other problems so you want will want to check this out and make a copy of it for future reference. Signs you might have problems is if you get one of those active x boxes show up for a few days and then goes away on it's own. I'm adding that because I remember that the person who I got the bulletin from had an active x box on her page some months back even though I had the updated software patches. And both we sent reports to myspace about the problems. Anyway below is a coy of the instructions:From the bulletin.
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How to Remove Viruses from your MySpace Pictures and get your email back
"From: ~Liz~
Date: Feb 21, 2007 1:41 PM
Subject Check your pics!
Body: Do this to check .
Below are instructions to see if your profile has been hacked. When I did this I found 3 fake pictures attached to my profile. Then when I changed everything, they had already attached another.
So this is something you would need to closely monitor and watch on a regular basis.
Just follow these steps below to see if you have been hacked:
Subject: Removing the picture virus
Body: First to see if you have it:
- Go in to "Edit Profile"
- Select "Safe Edit Mode" (in the top right corner)
- Select "Images" (third tab)
- Look to see if you have any strange pics on the left hand side. The x's are okay...
- If you have a strange pic of a person or animal that is not you, count down from the top or up from the bottom to see what number of your pics is infected
- Go in to your main page and select "Add/Change pics"
- Find the matching number pic that the virus was on and delete it. (you will not see anything strange when you view your own pics, unless in safe mode) I also saved my pic to file before deleting it and changed the pic name.(NOTE: Do NOT Save the INFECTED Picture To File That is a mistake you would then be putting the picture with the virus attatched in your files and your temp storage on your computer and then you would be reuploading the virus yourself - note added by debraford123)
- Go back into safe mode and make sure all the strange pics are gone. Again, the x's are okay.
- Change your password!!!
- Upload the deleted pics again from your computer.
- Double check and make sure in safe mode that all is okay"
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My own added notes:
If all the pictures look like little boxes with red x's in them your pictures are fine and you don't have to worry.
You absolutely need to check from the to down. If you go to the last picture with a problem and delete it then the virus moves up to the one above it. I don't know why but it did.
After you get to the images tab in safe edit mode, open your home page in a separate window and go to your add/edit pictures section. You can leave the edit pictures section open at the same time as you have safe mode open. After you delete the infected pictures one by one refresh the safe edit page where you have the infected pictures. They should disappear upon refresh. If it's still there you deleted the wrong one.
Immediately change your password. Remember to write it down and keep it in a safe place until you have memorized it. Sure you are certain that you won't forget, but it happens. That's why all sites have that famous question "Forgot your password?"
Right after deleting 5 infected photos and changing my password I logged out and relogged in with the new password. It is important for you to log out right after. If, (and I'm pretty sure this is the case) the virus causes automated actions, and you do not log out then the bots that are sending automated commands are still active and can still do damage. So please log out and relogin with your new password before you do anything else.
It is important to get this message to your friends. If your friend have infected photos and put them as their default photos, depending on what commands are associated with the particular virus definition you could be vulnerable just having those pictures show up on your profile even if it is only in a comment.
It is recommended that you subscribe to this blog at http://blog.myspace.com/theclulesswonder because I will post solutions to problems as I find out they really do work. If you subscribe you can set the subscription in the blog page to NOT send mail messages with each and every blog entry, because that can be a big pain. Especially true if I am only editing previous entries for spellings, grammer etc. Or, if you have an rss feeder you can subscribe and you will get the titles and a short snippet of the first few lines, so you won't have to check topics that don't interest you.
Think twice about downloading pictures from other people's "pics" because there is no way to know which are infected with viruses in the myspace pictures. There were 5 infected pictures in my other account at http://www.myspace.com/debraford123 I have removed them and now I have access to my out going mail for the first time in months. It was active immediatedly after deleting the pictures and relogging in with my new password. The Bee Bridge account had no viruses in the pictures. If you know someone who says they can't send mail, if it is like mine they can recieve mail. Send them a copy of the instructions so that they can fix thier accounts. Be a friend. or just send them a link to this blog. or post a bulletin or copy this to your blog. be my guest. Do something.
debraford123