BS: Mystery email

Subject: BS: Mystery email
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 22 Aug 12 - 04:20 AM

Just received a rather puzzling email from an old high school class mate. (ok, the "old" is a little redundant)

The email had no subject line.

It was addressed to about a dozen persons I didn't know, but might be people my classmate knew.

The only content was a link.

Although she did correspond some by email the possible subjects implied by the link name didn't seem like anything she would have had an interest in.

What's really puzzling is that this classmate died two years ago.

Does this mean that there's email in the afterlife?

If so, why haven't more of our old friends contacted us? (Yeah, they probably did contact some of you and you just never passed it on.)

I tried searching on some clues implied by the link, but couldn't find any unearthly possibilities via Google or Bing.

I was afraid to just click the link, 'cause maybe she didn't go that direction and I wouldn't want to risk dealing with the other side. She always seemed a good candidate for upward mobility, but I'm not sure whether that sort of advancement is always consistent with what we see in our friends.

Possible explanations, or suggestions about how to continue this correspondence would be welcome, especially if someone has a link to a friendly (heavenly?) place where I might get some advice on proper protocols for reply mailings to the dead (I doubt she's among the undead, but one never knows?)

[I wonder if my AV works in the "beyond."]

John

Subject: RE: BS: Mystery email
From: Joe Offer
Date: 22 Aug 12 - 04:35 AM

I get a lot of e-mails like that from friends, with just a link in the text of the e-mail. I make a practice of not clicking links that I can't identify as trustworthy.

I can't quite figure what's the story behind the e-mails. I'm guessing somebody hacked my friends' e-mail accounts, but I don't really know if that's the case.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Mystery email
From: Megan L
Date: 22 Aug 12 - 04:51 AM

well I don't know about emails but the first time we went to visit my aunts grave after the funeral GPO (Now BT) was parked there, the man was up a pole installing a line thankfully she must have forgotten our number. When i was at home one day I came in to hear dad saying "You have been gone a long time " he then put down the phonewhen i asked him who he had been talking to he siad the voice on the phone said "Hello it's yer auntie jean." not bad considering the woman had been dead 40 years by then.

Subject: RE: BS: Mystery email
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 22 Aug 12 - 05:27 AM

My old aunt Lil had numerous siblings with whom she'd lost touch over the years, particularly her brother Leslie. She'd been told he'd died of cancer many years before. Imagine her shock when decades later the phone rang and a voice piped up, "It's your brother Les!" She was disgusted that anyone could play such a cruel joke and hung up. It rang again and eventually the man persuaded her he was indeed my uncle Les, alive and well. They were reunited after all those years.
As for me, I'd never open an email from an unrecognised or suspect source. If folk want to get in touch that badly, they can jolly well do so by post! Same goes for unsolicited phone calls. I tell them to write if they need to contact me. They ought to have my address if they're legit.

Subject: RE: BS: Mystery email
From: Sawzaw
Date: 22 Aug 12 - 07:17 AM

Some careless or unaware users click on things that install malware on their computer.

The malware then gets all the address from their email and sends out spam laced with malware links to install the same thing on their friends computer.

I think it is best to use Yahoo email or similar free email services, install free malwarebytes on your computer and never click on anything suspicious, email or things that pop up, to find out what it is.

Google: Malware

The term 'malware" covers all sorts of malicious software designed to harm a computer or network. Malware can be installed on your machine without your knowledge, often through deceptive links or downloads posing as something you might be interested in. Once malware has been installed on your computer, cyber criminals can sometimes try to access your personal information. They do this by logging your keystrokes or monitoring your computer's activity. Your computer could also be controlled and forced to visit websites, send spam email or perform other actions without your knowledge. The effects of malware can be anything from a brief annoyance to identity theft.

A few examples of malware:

virus:
    a computer program that can copy itself and infect a computer.
worm:
    a self-replicating malware computer program, which uses a computer network to send copies of itself to other computers on the network.
spyware:
    a malware that collects small pieces of information about users without their knowledge.
adware:
    any software package which automatically plays, displays, or downloads advertisements to a computer.
Trojan horse:
    a destructive program that masquerades as an application. The software initially appears to perform a desirable function for the user prior to installation, but steals information or harms the system.......

More here

Subject: RE: BS: Mystery email
From: Wesley S
Date: 22 Aug 12 - 08:19 AM

We've also received two e-mails from a friend of ours that passed away years ago. I deleted them right away. I suggest you do the same.

Subject: RE: BS: Mystery email
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 22 Aug 12 - 09:32 AM

Hi, John. I'm intrigued by your statement that "Although she did correspond some by email the possible subjects implied by the link name didn't seem like anything she would have had an interest in."

Apparently she's died and gone to heaven, and earthly limitations are no more. What new activities have opened up for her? Playing harp? Becoming an upscale designer of angelic garb? LED halos?

Was she an indifferent singer on this earth? Has she suddenly become a gifted member of the heavenly host?

I keep seeing references to clouds when I do searches nowadays. Is she up in heaven, working on clouds?

Please tell me the 'possible subjects' have nothing to do with Viagra, penile enhancement or Nigerian philanthropists.

Subject: RE: BS: Mystery email
From: Amos
Date: 22 Aug 12 - 10:13 AM

Examine the full headers thereof and the actual source should be revealed. Chances are some not-too-bright spammer is thrashing an old, old list without realizing it.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Mystery email
From: GUEST,crazy little woman
Date: 22 Aug 12 - 11:16 AM

I believe somebody is needed here to translate (transmogrify) John's first post from Midwestern to global.

John is perfectly aware that the email from the deceased friend is a hoax. He's making a joke. Midwesterners can keep a joke going a long time until somebody from elsewhere (probably the east coast) bumbles in with some pragmatic, humorless declaration and breaks the spell.

Will they tell the outsider he is clueless and broke the spell? Never.

Now let's see if you guys can get this thread back on track.
===============
Leeneia: love the LED halos.

Subject: RE: BS: Mystery email
From: Bill D
Date: 22 Aug 12 - 12:26 PM

When folks die, their email accounts are not necessarily deleted immediately... and certainly many of their contacts have their address and links. I deal with this by having an email checker/reader that allows my to read mail without downloading it to MY PC.... and then I can delete it on the server if it looks even slightly suspicious.

I have used Pop3 scanmailbox for 10 years... still does all I need. And it has a cute little blue seahorse icon! (it is available from many places, as are others)

It takes only a few seconds to be sure that you are accepting only mail that you want.

Subject: RE: BS: Mystery email
From: Megan L
Date: 22 Aug 12 - 12:31 PM

He he he John it could have been worse she could have delivered it in person.

Subject: RE: BS: Mystery email
From: gnu
Date: 22 Aug 12 - 04:40 PM

How Grimm, Megan. >;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Mystery email
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 22 Aug 12 - 05:58 PM

An excellent point, Megan.

A few days ago, we had a beatiful rainbow over our street. I haven't seen one in a long time. John, did your friend like to embroider while still on Middle Earth? The rainbow might have been her work.

Maybe she was one of Kansas women who say "embroidry it" rather than "embroider it." (I heard that working in the fabric store.)

Subject: RE: BS: Mystery email
From: John P
Date: 23 Aug 12 - 12:24 AM

I've been carrying on an email conversation with my dead grandmother for years. What's the big deal? Did your grandmother not love you enough to stay in touch? She says she learned to play the harp and gets to have all the sex she wants, although she had to get used to working around the wings. I think it's so cool that they were able to link the World Wide Web with HeavenWeb. Apparently the only real problem is that Satan and crew have figured out how to spam the HeavenWeb, so she has to put up with a lot of messages about how to get rich and how to be a fundamentalist Christian.

Oh, for you Catholics out there, she says the rule is supposed to be "celebrate", not "celibate".

Subject: RE: BS: Mystery email
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 23 Aug 12 - 12:48 AM

I have qued four years of email and bbs postings.

Before the new year ...I expect to have a decade lined up.

This is child's play.

Sincerely
Gargoyle

AS LONG AS ... java script is turned with their "in box " it will send weekly messages...to an appropriate subject gleaned from:
1. Their open "notepad."
2. The most recent subject line of their most recent opened e -mail.
3. The "keyword " identifers of the last URL they visited.

Subject: RE: BS: Mystery email
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 23 Aug 12 - 02:45 PM

Hi, Gargoyle. I can see that there's something pink at the bottom of your post, but I can't read. Better go for red next time.

In that ten years, how many messages from Heaven have you received?

John P: working around the wings - that must be why somebody developed the knee trembler, as described in 'Angela's Ashes'.

About that rainbow I saw: there was a guy about twenty years old walking down my street at the time, looking sullen, speaking on the cell phone, and staring at his shoes. I decided to take a little risk, and I called out, "Say neighbor! Look up!" He didn't see me, hear me or look up. He never saw the rainbow.

I thought it over later, and I figure he's probably never seen a rainbow. Young people nowadays seem to spend so much time glued to one screen or another -- when would they see a rainbow?. Perhaps on a Scouting event or soccer game, if conditions happened to be just right...

As for me, I'm glad I'm not his age.

Subject: RE: BS: Mystery email
From: GUEST,999
Date: 23 Aug 12 - 03:18 PM

Leeneia: if you highlight what Gargoyle wrote it will show on your screen as white printing on a dark-blue background.

Subject: RE: BS: Mystery email
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 23 Aug 12 - 10:34 PM

Most of us discovered years ago that if you highlight the text it changes color and makes "soft colors" visible. In most browsers you can select/change what color is shown "instead of" what's posted.

The discovery was made public to many when someone tipped of the masses that "an important person involved with mudcat" had planted an invisible message at the bottom of all the threads. If you highlighted the blank space the text showed quite clearly, although it was in a place where you wouldn't even expect text.

Sadly, no such messages (at least any widely known) appear here any longer.

The method works generally, and not just at mudcat. I've occasionally run into entire web pages where the page designer used illegible color combinations that made reading extremely difficult, apparently in an attempt at being "artsy." Just "selecting" the text makes it much easier to read.

John

Subject: RE: BS: Mystery email
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 23 Aug 12 - 10:37 PM

Hint: select the second paragraph in my previous post as if you intended to copy it.

John