Note: I changed the IP address below...obviously...

From: <pannunzio@ucdavis.edu>

To: <bruce@brucegarrett.com>

Subject: Funny postcard

Good day.

Your Father has sent you Funny postcard from deepestfeelings.com.

Click on your card's direct www address below:

http:/127.0.0.1/

Copyright (c) 1992-2007 deepestfeelings.com All Rights Reserved 

Oh how nice…dad sent me a postcard.  Except dad’s been dead now for over three decades.  And so has Rod Serling so I doubt that’s a link to a web site running on a server somewhere in the Twilight Zone.  Nice idea for a story though.  But no…what’s waiting for me on the other side of that helpful link is some sort of spam, probably along with some sort of malicious javascript attack.

Deepest Feelings is it?  I have some Deepest Feelings all right.  You have to really loath someone who exploits other people’s affections, whether it’s for profit or just because it gives them kicks.  In case you haven’t heard or seen one yourself yet, there is a pretty major spam/malicious software attack on people’s computer’s going on now all over the Internet, that uses this greeting card ploy.  I’ve seen plenty of others that use some form of intrusive tactical syntax on your feelings.  Just as computers are susceptible to malicious code, humans are susceptible to malicious words, the right combination of which can expose all our root functions to other devious humans.  To compromise a computer, first you compromise the human controlling it.  Oh…dad sent me a card…

But then…when aren’t our feelings under malicious attack these days.  Karl Rove.  James Dobson.  Exodus International.  Talk Radio.  Family Values.  Defend Marriage.  Support Our Troops.  Question Homosexuality.  Don’t you want America to win in Iraq?  They’re Taking Christ Out Of Christmas.  Save Our Children.  About 98 percent of everything you read and hear in the popular media these days is tactical syntax, cynically designed to get past your defenses and into your core where you can be easily manipulated.  You’re lucky if it’s only your money they want once they’ve gotten in.  The people who write malicious software are just doing to our machines, what we do to each other every day anyway.

This isn’t a perfect firewall…but it’s a helpful start.  You need to study how this stuff works, to defend yourself from it.

I suppose I’ll be getting a card from mom soon…