The primary purpose of the Windows 2000 Active Directory administered by DANS is Sophos Enterprise Manager, which provides virus protection to all CFA computers running the Windows operating system. Since its deployment, the number of work-hours lost to eliminating viruses has decreased dramatically, particularly for computers running Windows 2000 or later.
Other benefits of the Active Directory Server are convenient cross-college file-sharing, without the risk of commonly exploited security problems that peer-to-peer sharing has, and regular backup of files stored on the server.
Sophos Enterprise Manager updates the virus definition files on college computers several times daily.
Latest virus news around the college:
- Do not click!!! There is a message making its way (many times, for some) into inboxes that either claims to be about a $175 PayPal purchase or about a webcam. If you use Windows and click on the link, your computer is likely to become infected with a worm. Please simply delete these emails. If you have clicked on the link and are on a university-owned computer, contact Joe or Cynthia at 621-1272 immediately. If you clicked the link while using a personal computer, please see this information page for assistance.
- See also the Email Hoax page for information on messages that attempt to cause virus "panic" or other annoying distractions.
- The MyDoom worm and variants are still making their way around, causing people to receive large amounts of email from "spoofed" addresses. Your email address may be harvested from an infected machine and used as a spoof address, causing messages that you never sent to bounce back to you or causing people to warn you that you're spreading a virus when you know you haven't sent email to them recently. These are, unfortunately, symptoms that aren't easy to fight except with patience and the "DELETE" button in your email client. See also the SoBig entry below. (Jan 30, 2004)
- Please do not ever trust email attachments claiming to be virus remedies or security patches. Microsoft NEVER sends patches as email attachments, no matter how much a message may look like it's from microsoft.com. These are invariably viruses or other malicious code. If you have any questions or concerns about the virus protection on your computer, please contact DATS first before acting on any email message. (Sept 18, 2003)
- Please remember to log out of all Windows 2000 and Windows XP computers in the Fine Arts Complex logged out but leave the computer turned on when you leave each day. Patches and other maintenance tasks occur overnight on the network. (Sept 17, 2003)
- The Blaster worm caused more annoyance than downtime and was contained quickly. (Aug 19, 2003)
- The SoBig worm is still making its way around, causing people to receive large amounts of email from "spoofed" addresses. Your email address may be harvested from an infected machine and used as a spoof address, causing messages that you never sent to bounce back to you or causing people to warn you that you're spreading a virus when you know you haven't sent email to them recently. These are, unfortunately, symptoms that aren't easy to fight except with patience and the "DELETE" button in your email client. (Aug 22, 2003)