from CNN's website:

www.cnn.com/TECH/computing/9903/31/melissamarine.idg/

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Melissa takes down Marine Corps e-mail

March 31, 1999 Web posted at: 8:46 a.m. EST (1318 GMT)

by Daniel Verton

(IDG) -- The fast-spreading e-mail virus "Melissa" forced the Marine Corps to shut down its base-to-base e-mail communications, a spokeswoman for the Marines confirmed Tuesday.

According to the spokeswoman, the Marines are able to communicate internally within each base, but all base-to-base e-mail connectivity has been shut down until network administrators feel comfortable that they have taken the appropriate security measures to protect against the virus. Other Internet connections between bases has not been affected.

A spokeswoman for the Defense Department's Joint Task Force for Computer Network Defense said the Army and the Air Force took their servicewide servers down over the weekend to purge them of any messages that might contain the Melissa macrovirus.

Melissa began infecting systems across the country late last week and comes in the form of an e-mail attachment. While the virus does no harm to an organization's data or software, it can slow down and eventually crash the e-mail server. The virus propagates itself by using a PC user's e-mail address book to forward itself to other users

-- Roland (nottelling@nowhere.com), March 31, 1999

Answers

It's always in the details, isn't it?

Diane

-- Diane J. Squire (sacredspaces@yahoo.com), March 31, 1999.

Hmmm, you wait, this programmer's a** is grass. They charge him with the capital offense of unleashing a "Weapon of Mass-Distraction."

-- Brett Blatchley (bblatchl@inmar-inc.com), March 31, 1999.

Funny how IDG left out a significant fact: it's not ALL e-mail address books, only MS Outlook. How DARE they panic all those users of Notes abd cc:Mail and Communicator and Groupwise! The installed base of just IBM/Lotus e-mail users is millions more than Microsoft's. IDG is engaging in blatant fear-mongering! 8-}]

-- Mac (sneak@lurk.com), March 31, 1999.

See this link for a lowbrow cyber attack from Yugoslavia on NATO:

http://www.c nn.com/WORLD/europe/9903/31/nato.hack/

I'm sure they can do better though. Who wouldn't bet that there are a lot of smart programmers in Yugoslavia, and that a significant percentage of them are engaged in writing the most destructive viruses they can think of?

-- Ned (entaylor@cloudnet.com), March 31, 1999.

The Y2K potential for cyberattacks, is not to be taken lightly.

*Sigh*

Diane

MARCH 30, 1999 . . . 18:00 EST

Melissa prompts rapid DOD alert

BY ANNE ARMSTRONG (annea@fcw.com)

http://www.fcw.com/pubs/fcw/1999/0329/web-melissa-3-30- 99.html

DENVER -- The first flash message in the history of the Defense Department about a computer problem went out Friday night to warn DOD users worldwide about the "Melissa" virus, according to Col. John Thomas, chief of the Global Operations and Security Office in the Defense Information Systems Agency.

Flash messages take precedence over all other administrative messages on DOD networks. Other flash messages could include emergency action messages such as alert messages, deployment orders and imminent-danger messages.

"Melissa hit us hard on Friday night, but the fast action allowed us to get the word to Europe before much damage was done. It didn't blow up as some had expected because we got on it pretty quick," Thomas told attendees at the Information Processing Interagency Conference here.

Although some 23,000 infected e-mails had to be cleansed, the virus has not had large operational impact. "We have crested a very important hill in DOD because our commanders now appreciate how dependent their units are on information technology," Thomas said. "IT assets are reported operationally just like ships or tanks."

And...

MARCH 30, 1999 . . . 10:40 EST

Melissa virus stows away aboard Navy ship

BY BOB BREWIN (antenna@fcw.com)

http://www.fcw.com/pubs/fcw/1999/0329/web-ship-3-30-99.html

ABOARD THE USS BLUE RIDGE -- The wildly proliferating computer virus "Melissa," which has infected e-mail servers across government and the private sector, has made its way to e-mail accounts on this command ship of the U.S. 7th Fleet, operating 20 miles of the coast of Guam in the western Pacific Ocean.

The Melissa macrovirus, which began hitting systems last week, comes in the form of an e-mail attachment. While the virus does no harm to an organization's data or software, it can slow down and eventually crash the e-mail server. The virus propagates itself by using a PC user's e-mail address book to forward itself to other users.

But, thanks to a timely alert from the Navy's Fleet Information Warfare Center (FIWC), the Blue Ridge managed to stop Melissa before its spread, according to Cmdr. Michael Felmly, assistant chief of staff for command, control, communications, computers and intelligence for the 7th Fleet.

"We got a heads up on what to do and what not do to do" last weekend from FIWC via the Navy's Pacific Region Network Operations center in Hawaii, Felmly said. The center supports the Blue Ridge and the eight 7th Fleet ships participating in the semiannual Tandem Thrust exercise.

The information technology staff identified three e-mails that had the virus and isolated them before they spread throughout the ship's unclassified local-area network, which hosts 1,600 e-mail accounts, said Dennis Kaida, a network and systems engineer from the Navy's Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command and who is temporarily assigned to the Blue Ridge for Tandem Thrust.

Kaida said that by the time the 7th Fleet network staff had isolated the e-mails containing the virus, the network crew had gone to the Symantec Corp. home page and downloaded Norton AntiVirus software that works against the Melissa virus.

Vice Adm. Walter Doran, commander of the 7th Fleet, said that the ability of the Melissa virus to make its way to this ship -- the showcase of the networked Navy with a high-speed fiber-optic backbone and multiple satellite links to the outside world -- highlighted the downside of such connectivity.

In the not-so-distant past, Doran said, "when you went to sea, you took off the lines" and lost most connections to the world "except for a squawky radio." But, thanks to the high speed network and satellite connections, Doran said, "we are very much connected even at sea." In fact, shortly after concluding the Melissa battle, the ship's staff had to gear up to fight off the similar "Papa" virus, which attacks Microsoft Corp. Excel spreadsheets.

And ...

MARCH 30, 1999 . . . 13:50 EST

Melissa takes down Marine Corps e-mail

BY DANIEL VERTON (dan_verton@fcw.com)

http://www.fcw.com/pubs/fcw/1999/0329/web-usmc-3-30-99.html

The fast-spreading e-mail virus "Melissa" has forced the Marine Corps to shut down its base-to-base e-mail communications at least until tomorrow, a spokeswoman for the Marines confirmed today.

According to the spokeswoman, the Marines are able to communicate internally within each base, but all base-to-base e-mail connectivity has been shut down until network administrators feel comfortable that they have taken the appropriate security measures to protect against the virus. Other Internet connections between bases has not been affected.

A spokeswoman for the Defense Department's Joint Task Force for Computer Network Defense said the Army and the Air Force took their servicewide servers down over the weekend to purge them of any messages that might contain the Melissa macrovirus.

Melissa began infecting systems across the country late last week and comes in the form of an e-mail attachment. While the virus does no harm to an organization's data or software, it can slow down and eventually crash the e-mail server. The virus propagates itself by using a PC user's e-mail address book to forward itself to other users.

-- Diane J. Squire (sacredspaces@yahoo.com), March 31, 1999.

Brett,

"Weapons of Mass Distraction" !!! Suspect some think that your decription is kind of porny but I'll give you two point for that one.

jh

-- john hebert (jt_hebert@hotmail.com), March 31, 1999.

That Melissa She was always heaven to the Army But she was rotten to the corps

-- jerbek (jjbeck@recyclermail.com), March 31, 1999.