[B.I.]

I have been investigating this phenomenon which occurs occasionally on
inward e-mails and inward messages. It appears that this symbol appears
as a sub for (:-) when the sender inserts a "smiley", but why only
occasionally?

[Tom J]

"B.I." <B.I.@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:d8jses$lcc$1@newsg4.svr.pol.co.uk...
>I have been investigating this phenomenon which occurs occasionally
>on inward e-mails and inward messages. It appears that this symbol
>appears as a sub for (:-) when the sender inserts a "smiley", but why
>only occasionally?

Because someone is sending you email in html code with a file
involved, such as a gif or jpg. I would never open my email
restrictions enough to get such things. If you do, virus is sure to
enter soon.

Tom J

[N. Miller]

On Mon, 13 Jun 2005 12:59:24 +0100, B.I. wrote:

> I have been investigating this phenomenon which occurs occasionally on
> inward e-mails and inward messages. It appears that this symbol appears
> as a sub for (:-) when the sender inserts a "smiley", but why only
> occasionally?

Usually that indicates a file which was not downloaded from the remote
server. A number of reasons for why that is happening. If you loosen things
up enough so that never happens, you increase the risk of that remote file
being an executable, not an image; and that executable file may be
malicious. The problem is, MS products try to be helpful. If the file type
is different from the declaration, MSOE will call the file handler for that
file type. So, for a .exe file type, MSOE would call the handler which
would run that file. In order for that to be blocked, MSOE must be
configured to not call the file handlers for files on remote servers. Or
something like that...

--
Norman
~Win dain a lotica, En vai tu ri, Si lo ta
~Fin dein a loluca, En dragu a sei lain
~Vi fa-ru les shutai am, En riga-lint

[B.I.]

"Tom J" <tomj_ga@despammed.com> wrote in message
news:iegre.3592$VK4.229@newsread1.news.atl.earthlink.net...
>
> "B.I." <B.I.@hotmail.com> wrote in message
> news:d8jses$lcc$1@newsg4.svr.pol.co.uk...
>>I have been investigating this phenomenon which occurs occasionally on
>>inward e-mails and inward messages. It appears that this symbol
>>appears as a sub for (:-) when the sender inserts a "smiley", but why
>>only occasionally?
>
> Because someone is sending you email in html code with a file
> involved, such as a gif or jpg. I would never open my email
> restrictions enough to get such things. If you do, virus is sure to
> enter soon.
>
> Tom J
>Thanks Tom. I do not think that to be the case as both parties are
>experienced posters, and the symbol appeared in a position where a
>"smiley" had been used.

Is it possible that they are extracting the 'smiley' from another
source, rather than constructing it from brackets colon dash etc., so
that the 'smiley' is 'seen' as a picture?

[N. Miller]

On Tue, 14 Jun 2005 09:14:45 +0100, B.I. wrote:

> "Tom J" <tomj_ga@despammed.com> wrote in message
> news:iegre.3592$VK4.229@newsread1.news.atl.earthlink.net...
>>
>> "B.I." <B.I.@hotmail.com> wrote in message
>> news:d8jses$lcc$1@newsg4.svr.pol.co.uk...
>>>I have been investigating this phenomenon which occurs occasionally on
>>>inward e-mails and inward messages. It appears that this symbol
>>>appears as a sub for (:-) when the sender inserts a "smiley", but why
>>>only occasionally?
>>
>> Because someone is sending you email in html code with a file
>> involved, such as a gif or jpg. I would never open my email
>> restrictions enough to get such things. If you do, virus is sure to
>> enter soon.
>
> Is it possible that they are extracting the 'smiley' from another
> source, rather than constructing it from brackets colon dash etc., so
> that the 'smiley' is 'seen' as a picture?

Yes.

--
Norman
~Win dain a lotica, En vai tu ri, Si lo ta
~Fin dein a loluca, En dragu a sei lain
~Vi fa-ru les shutai am, En riga-lint