E-Mail Virus Klez Worm Squirms Across The Internet Internet Download Speeds Have You Ever Wondered? Ask the Help Desk "Unsticking" Web Pages Sites of the Month Great Sites To Check Out In May! Short Tutorial Downloading Web Pages Faster

Dear Netlink Customer, Spring is in the air! It's time to get your lawn looking green, to buy graduation presents and plan your summer vacation ... and the Internet is a great idea resource for each of these endeavors! To help get your spring season off to a good start, this month's eNewsletter provides some helpful Internet tips as well as websites that are especially useful this month. Happy surfing! The goal of each of our monthly eNewsletters is to keep our subscribers informed regarding their Internet connection and to improve their Internet experience. To meet this goal, each monthly newsletter will usually contain information related to: Warnings on a recent virus or e-mail hoax that may affect you An update regarding any new services we are making available An answer to a frequently asked Internet related question Some fun, seasonal websites to check out A short step-by-step tutorial on an e-mail or browser related task We think you'll find the information contained in this newsletter to be a valuable tool for enhancing your Internet experience. If, however, you'd prefer not to receive these bulletins on a monthly basis, click HERE. To see what's inside this issue, take a look at the index to the left and thanks for reading! - The Netlink Team

E-Mail Virus - Klez Worm Squirms Across The Internet

A new E-mail Virus, called "W32/Klez.h@MM Worm," was discovered spreading across the Internet at a moderate rate beginning in mid-April. Although it is not necessarily destructive, it can be very annoying. Here are a few of the details:

• The W32/Klez.h@MM E-mail Worm appears to have been created in Asia and was first discovered on April 17, 2002.
  
  
• The W32/Klez.h@MM E-mail Worm grabs e-mail addresses from the infected computer's Windows address book or ICQ database and sends copies of the worm to each of the e-mail addresses. The worm also disguises the actual source of the e-mail by randomly selecting e-mail addresses from the Windows address book or ICQ database to be shown as the "sender" of the e-mail. So, if you receive the e-mail worm from a friend, chances are the person it shows being sent from is probably not the person who actually sent it to you.
  
  
• The "Subject Line" of the e-mail can include variations of 120 possibilities. Common subject headings include the words "let's be friends," "some questions," "meeting notice," "congratulations," and "how are you." The worm selects the wording randomly.
  
  
• Not only does the e-mail worm copy itself and get forwarded to other e-mail addresses, the worm also randomly copies files (including confidential documents) from the infected computer's hard drive and forwards this information as an attachment as well -- using randomly selected file extensions like ".txt," ".doc," ".mpg," or ".html." In other words, the worm normally sends two attachments with each e-mail message: the worm itself and a copy of a document found on the infected computer.
  
  
• The text section within the "E-mail Message Pane" can either contain words (randomly selected and varies greatly) or can be empty.
  
  
• The virus infects only Windows operating systems.

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Internet Download Speeds - Have You Ever Wondered?

Have you ever wondered about your download speeds?

For the most part, the speeds are in the actual range they should be. For example, if you are downloading a program off the Internet and the rate is at 8 K per seconds (also known as K\sec or kbps) the actual download speed is different. The K\sec stands for Kilo Byte. The industry standard for reading downloads is in the form of Kilo Byte.

To get back to our example of 8K\sec, to figure the actual download speed, you need to multiply the number, in our example 8 by 8. After the multiplication has occurred, the speed is 64 K\sec. That is the download speed in this example. Of course, 8K\sec is just an example. The speed will vary from one download site to another. It is dependant on the download or FTP site you are accessing. This is not the actual connection speed, but this is the download or FTP speed. The Internet connection speed is generally higher than the download speed. This is why Web Pages usually seem to pull up faster than your download takes place.

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Ask The Help Desk - "Unsticking" Web Pages

Question: Sometimes when I go to download a web page it seems to get "stuck" and the requested page does not appear. When this happens to me, I go back to the address bar and type the web address in again. Am I doing something wrong?

Answer: It doesn't sound like it. Remember, the Internet is like a huge highway system with traffic going in a variety of directions all at the same time. Sometimes, traffic can get "held up" at intersections along the way. If this happens to you again, a simpler way of re-attempting to download the web page is to hit the "Stop" button, located on the browser's menu bar, to cancel the download and then the "Refresh" button, also on your browser's menu bar. ("Refresh" when using Internet Explorer; "Reload" if using Netscape Navigator.) This "getting stuck" phenomenon apparently happens frequently enough for browser makers to have created a button to help out in these situations. If the page download still seems stuck after hitting "Refresh," click "Stop" on your browser's menu bar, bookmark the web page and come back to it later.

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Great Sites to Check Out This Month

The Making Of A Perfect Lawn
http://american-lawns.com/ -  This site provides all the information you'll need to create the best looking lawn on the block this summer. The site includes information on the best types of grasses to use, fertilizing techniques, mowing tips, "sick lawn" advice and "Big Bad Bug" illustrations. Of course, you could simply hire a good lawn care service...

Car Trip Essentials For The Family
http://family.go.com/travel/places/feature/dony119tra_lists/dony119tra_lists.html -  Are you hitting the road for Memorial Day weekend? Or how about planning your summer vacation to Wally World? Family Fun magazine provides a handy online check-off list that'll make your family's next road trip more enjoyable. Don't forget those extra pillows, no-spill cups and snacks (in zippered plastic bags, of course). Martha Stewart will be proud of you!

Star Wars Episode II: Attack Of The Clones
http://starwars.com/episode-ii/ -  It's the Official Site of the new George Lucas film entitled "Star Wars Espisode II: Attack of the Clones." (May 16th is the release date.) Everything you wanted to know (except, of course, the climatic ending) about the movie is included in the site ... daily news & features, photos, cast & crew, movie trailers, and more. May the force be with you!

Survivor Marquesas Television Show
http://cbs.com/primetime/survivor4/ -  It's the Official Site of Survivor Marquesas. Will your favorite contestant make it through the final Tribunal Council to win one million dollars? This site includes bios of all participants and a review of the most recent show. It even includes a preview of the next week's episode. Listen to comments by contestants right after they've been booted by the Tribal Council. Vote on your favorite Survivor and participate in Survivor Chat.

86th Annual Running Of The Indy 500
http://brickyard.com -  "Gentlemen. Start your engines." Actually, both men and women drivers will no doubt be competing to win first place in the world's largest single-day sporting event - The Indianapolis 500. Practice runs begin on May 5th and the site provides daily updates through this year's race day - May 26th. The site also includes webcams, pace car info, race history, practice schedules, ticket information and more!

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Short Tutorial - Downloading Web Pages Faster

Did you know that you can adjust your web browser (Internet Explorer or Netscape Navigator) to download some web pages more quickly? You can change the settings of your browser to download only the text of web pages and ignore files that take longer to download, i.e. graphics, sounds, videos, etc.

To adjust Internet Explorer (on a Windows operating system) to ignore certain files when downloading a web page follow these steps:

1. Click your cursor arrow on "Tools" located at the top of your browser on its Toolbar.
2. From the resulting drop down menu, click your cursor arrow on "Internet Options" and then click on the "Advanced" tab.
3. Next, scroll through the list of checked items under "Multimedia" and "uncheck" (click your cursor arrow on the boxes) the items you want your browser to skip downloading, i.e. "Play sounds," "Show pictures," "Play videos," and "Play animations."
4. Click your cursor arrow on "Apply" and then "OK."
5. Of course, to add these items back to the list of files to download when accessing web pages, follow the same procedure listed above but add check marks back into the item boxes, click "Apply" and then "OK."
   

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We hope you found this newsletter to be informative. It's our way of keeping you posted on the happenings at our shop. If, however, you'd prefer not to receive these bulletins on a monthly basis, click HERE.

Thanks for your business!

Best regards

Mike Huggenberger
Director
Great Plains Communications Netlink

©2002 Cornerstone Publishing Group Inc.