Chain Mail, Phishing....

A brief note to explain why I don't like chain mail. People who send you chain mail share your email with an indeterminate number of people you don't know. And sooner or later your email passes into the public domain, and you find yourself bombarded with spam. And while most spam filters these days are pretty good at blocking it, you still have to check your 'junk' box to make sure nothing legitimate has got misdirected. In short, it's a pain.

So, for some time now, I've not passed it on, and sent polite 'No, thanks' notes to people who send it to me. But sooner or later someone else sends me one. So I'm putting a signature on my mail now telling people I don't welcome it. "I don't share my email with people I don't know. If you send me chain mail you're sharing it for me". I hope it doesn't sound rude....

As I've said before, everyone needs at least two email accounts. One should be used with friends and people you trust to respect your privacy; the other for everything else. My 'public' email gets loads of spam, but my private one hasn't had any this far (there, I've tempted fate, haven't I?).

The Velez-Diaz saga needs rounding off too. Their site reappeared, and this time a 'whois' actually gave the name, address, telephone, and email for Joanna Velez-Diaz, who was most surprised to hear from me. But it does seem that the site is legitimate, and the phishing pages were hacked into the site.

Finally, a mystery. Well a mystery to me that is; most computing bods will know exactly. I've seen phishes recently that have concealed code at the bottom (using white text on white background). It all looks rather like the stuff that comes up when you get the infamous BSOD, and no doubt has some malign intent, should you be foolish enough to open the email in say, Outlook, rather than using a web-based mail. But if you're passing by and know exactly what it does, please post a comment; I'd love to know. This, for example, was hidden at the end of a recent 'Royal Bank of Scotland' phish :
0x4228, 0x72761993, 0x40 start, tmp, update, NGL, XWBR 0x93889253, 0x26883050, 0x093, 0x4, 0x836, 0x267, 0x5, 0x79, 0x62 0x907, 0x0, 0x98175715, 0x96744278, 0x694, 0x7766 S5E: 0x059, 0x811, 0x42019273, 0x02119710, 0x6959, 0x4, 0x096, 0x86479479, 0x6544, 0x78, 0x75844392, 0x00, 0x447, 0x88, 0x921 0x342, 0x84, 0x00, 0x48622110, 0x70, 0x1208 source: 0x617, 0x33, 0x3560, 0x1, 0x211, 0x723, 0x2, 0x65, 0x49118100, 0x92, 0x84090947, 0x91769642, 0x12, 0x0100, 0x92263527 OBD: 0x536, 0x1214, 0x28 0x986, 0x9, 0x3

0x8396, 0x83, 0x36789709, 0x22, 0x3380, 0x4, 0x2, 0x74, 0x770, 0x087 DYX6: 0x3, 0x2, 0x11434130, 0x86353061, 0x0, 0x54717057 J5LB: 0x2, 0x78974884, 0x433, 0x91877241, 0x4, 0x81, 0x713, 0x836, 0x87301466, 0x6421, 0x34, 0x35, 0x8, 0x9569 dec stack TFRG Q8II serv cvs CWSM 04O HG1I. 0x7, 0x56, 0x1, 0x990, 0x6843, 0x14 OZ3: 0x4, 0x16, 0x71503439, 0x3589, 0x1310, 0x27862888, 0x967, 0x74, 0x5200, 0x4672, 0x9463 create, update, P2H. update: 0x319, 0x64587121, 0x9568, 0x67, 0x20503463, 0x1 0x262, 0x04, 0x024, 0x4, 0x4, 0x1009, 0x0, 0x5, 0x286, 0x51 0x3227, 0x36552697, 0x2, 0x2200, 0x580, 0x90240837, 0x96, 0x2097, 0x4077, 0x93474775, 0x069, 0x8, 0x7866

0x02, 0x7106, 0x39556455, 0x5, 0x07, 0x1509, 0x41, 0x7111, 0x651, 0x23524145, 0x467 dec: 0x466 0x37773781, 0x547 0x0, 0x3, 0x62, 0x7004, 0x72, 0x29844702, 0x27255691, 0x301, 0x2, 0x3, 0x1, 0x4604, 0x4077, 0x82034915 CSJ, stack, hex, Y46I, include0x40, 0x140, 0x56136335, 0x98, 0x483, 0x09, 0x72520667, 0x6806, 0x4169, 0x82858326, 0x55183934, 0x83269347 0x12, 0x14, 0x2, 0x71, 0x33, 0x99 0x75210624, 0x0, 0x36, 0x7, 0x1, 0x8, 0x9384, 0x37941281, 0x7, 0x9, 0x254, 0x426, 0x1 rev TLAS tmp interface J0GL UAV6 stack engine 0x814, 0x20668964, 0x000, 0x545, 0x5, 0x09, 0x34526887

Any ideas?