New worm virus courtesy of MS Outlook

A "new and dangerous" worm virus is spreading through e-mail systems using Microsoft Outlook, the FBI's National Infrastructure Protection Centre (NIPC) warns.

The virus is attached to an e-mail message with the subject, "Resume - Janet Simons." The attachment is a Microsoft Word (.doc) file called resume.doc or explorer.doc.

When a victim opens the attachment, the virus sends itself to everyone in the address book. When the user closes the Word document, the virus deletes files on the user's machine. NIPC did not say which files, or which class of files, would be wiped.

The body of the message reads:

"To Director of Sales/Marketing,

Attached is my resume with a list of references contained within. Please feel free to call or e-mail me if you have any further questions regarding my experience. I am looking forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

Janet Simons"

The message should be deleted without being opened. However, the NIPC recommends that users not delete the message until first deactivating Outlook's "executive summary" feature.

Virus fans are likely to be disappointed by this one. Releasing it late in the day before a holiday weekend gives network administrators time to defeat it before the work-week e-mail traffic on which such viruses thrive will resume. ®