One of the first things a virus does when it gets into your computer is head straight to your email address book. Once it has access to your email address book it can start spreading to everyone else within it. Then when it gets into the computers of the people in your address book it will do the same thing with their address book and so on and so on. This is how viruses spread so rapidly and more often than not your computer would have spread the threat without you having any knowledge of it.

There is one trick that you can do to try and take care of a virus attack on your email address book. This trick is simple and can be very helpful to stop it spread. If you have more than one email address book for different email accounts then you will need to use this procedure for all.

Firstly, go into your email address book and click on 'add a new contact'. A new window should open where you would enter the details of your contact. In this window, in the section where you would normally type in the first name of your contact, type an exclamation point followed by three zeroes so it would look like this - !000. Then in the section where you would enter your new contacts email address type in 'WormAlert'. Then click 'add' and 'ok'. By entering !000 as the name this will put this contact at the top of your address book list.

Then if a virus tries to access your address book it starts with the first entry in your list and works its way down. Since the first address is an invalid address the mail is returned and the threat goes no further. You will be notified almost immediately that you have had mail undelivered which will let you know that you possibly have a virus trying to access your address book.

Email viruses can also access your computer another way. Many scam emails are sent with a subject topic that will grab your attention. It may be something like 'sorry I took so long to reply' or 'what time is good for you'. The scammers use subjects that sound personal and let you think that the email is from someone you know. When it grabs your attention you go in and open it and that's it - the virus is in. It will run loose on your computer and depending on what type of virus it is it can cause some very serious problems for you. The only way to avoid getting it through this way is to be very, very careful about opening emails.

Only open an email if you definitely know the person it is from and particularly NEVER open email attachments unless you know for sure it is from a reliable source. Be particularly careful with attachments that end in .exe .vbs or .scr, these are they type that end to carry viruses, although there are many .pdf attachments being sent in scam emails lately. Basically unless you are expecting the attachment and know it's reliable, then just don't open it and delete the email immediately.

About the Author

Azwan Asmat is the author of Chuang Computer Tips - http://chuangcomputer.blogspot.com - Online threats have become a major computer security issue. Would you like to know the secret of securing your PC from dangerous spyware, adware, and malware programs that can ruin your PC, your finances, and your sanity?!! Visit http://www.chuangcomputer.com/pcsafety/ for more info.