Virus Alert from Le Regent Hotel?
 

If you communicated by email with Le Regent recently, you may have received this virus alert from them this AM. If so, did you do the search for the virus? I did and my search said file wasn't found. Anything else to do about it?

This sounds like the virus someone mentioned last week. Apparently if you contacted a European car rental company you got the virus.

I received the email alerting me to the virus and I followed the instructions and I did find the virus just like they said. I wasn't really clear on what it does to your computer but I hope following the instructions given does it.

I don't know exactly what virus you were alerted to or what instructions you were given to find and "remove" it, but please, never follow instructions to remove viruses sent to you by anyone (including your Mom, best friend, hotel, rental car agency, casual acquaintance, etc.) unless you check it out on a web site such as the Symantec (Norton AntiVirus), McAfee, or other valid anti-virus website to determine the validity and insure you are not the victim of a hoax.<BR><BR>There have been instances of "virus detection and removal instructions" being sent which may cause damage to your computer system by removing required operating system files. The file, which supposedly is a sign of the “virus”, is a normal file and its removal may actually cause problems. Those sending you this information are also victims -- they believe they are doing you a service by forwarding information they too received from their mom, best friend, customer, etc., when in actuality they are perpetrating a harmful hoax.<BR><BR>Any time you are alerted to a virus, please check the bona fide web sites to determine if it is a valid virus or a hoax and only follow the removal instructions posted on such a site. <BR><BR>Also, please remember, one of the biggest errors computer users make is to believe that because they have an anti-virus software package installed on their computer, that they are "protected". You are only protected if you religiously ensure your anti-virus definitions are updated on a regular basis. With all the new viruses being released on a regular basis, the virus definitions must be updated to protect you. I would recommend that, regardless of which anti-virus software package you use, you update your definitions, at a minimum, weekly and immediately if you hear of a new virus on the loose. Daily is better. Many programs, such as Norton, can be set up to perform auto update at a predetermined interval.<BR>

The virus was sulftnbk.exe. Both my husband and got the message from Le Regent this morning also. <BR><BR>Diana, I did mention to my husband that I didn't think it was a good idea to follow the delete instructions, but he did it anyway. Our search indicated the same thing Jack said - we did not have the virus. <BR><BR>I will check it out, though, as you mentioned. Thanks.

Unfortunately, the sulfnbk.exe warning is listed on the Symantec site as a hoax. The report is here: <BR>http://www.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/sulfnbk.exe.warning.html.<BR><BR>Good news is that apparently, according to the Symantec report, the file is not required to run Windows so unless you need to restore long file names, you haven't done any major harm. The Symantec report does give instructions on restoring the deleted file as well.

As Diane pointed out this is just a hoax to get you to delete this file. The lesson being to only let your anti-virus program tell you what has a virus and must be deleted. Another point is that the file apparently only exists in Win 95/98/Me and not in Win XP and 2K.<BR>