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How to turn off previewing of emails in Outlook

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Bruno2000

Technical User
Mar 31, 2002
34
SE
Due to a virus i recently had i want to know how to turn off the previewing thing in Outlook Express.
 
All preview does it allow you to view the text and sometimes will let you view the type of file that is attached. I've never heard of anyone getting a virus because they were previewing an email. To get a virus you MUST open the attachment. Virus attachments usually come in the form of an .exe or zip file, but there are many different ways a virus is sent. -Brad
A+, MCSE NT4, MCDBA SQL7

-Best cartoon of all time :-D 'Spongebob Squarepants' [cook]
 
BradSQLGuy wrote:

"To get a virus you MUST open the attachment."


Sadly, this is no longer true.
There are strains of virus coding (namely the ILOVEYOU virus) which are completely contained with HTML coding, and are executed merely by being displayed. Microsoft continues to roll out security updates, but they can only respond after another virus is discovered, after it's been floating around infecting PCs a while.
 
The ILOVEYOU virus was a link that when clicked on you had to download something directly onto your PC. HTML viruses need to be ran from and downloaded from the source.


1. In order for the virus to infect other pages, it must be run from a
local copy of the infected web page. That is, instead of viewing a web
page on a web server, you must first download it to your machine and
then view the local copy. This is necessary for the virus to get a copy
of itself to attach to another web page.

2. The Scripting Run-time Library must be installed on your system. The
Scripting Run-time Library contains the File System Object which is what
VBScript uses to access the local file system. Without that object,
a VBScript script cannot access files on the local system. The Scripting
Run-time Library is currently shipped with the Internet Information
Server (IIS) module of the Windows NT 4 Server operating system and the
Windows Scripting Host.

So basically you still MUST download from a source and then view a copy on your machine. Preview is still safe even from HTML viruses. -Brad
A+, MCSE NT4, MCDBA SQL7

-Best cartoon of all time :-D 'Spongebob Squarepants' [cook]
 
If you were just viewing HTML then there would be a massive problem just viewing websites. I am very glad though they don't have viruses like that...yet. -Brad
A+, MCSE NT4, MCDBA SQL7

-Best cartoon of all time :-D 'Spongebob Squarepants' [cook]
 
Here's some links for you BradSQLGuy:





"Valentin mass mailer, has no subject line, no content, and no attachment when inbound. The code automatically runs in outlook express and in the preview pane of MS Outlook, Auto drop .HTA file. On next reboot machine distributes mass mailing."
 
Yes you're right. I was not aware of that. Apparently Microsoft did make improvements in Outlook 2k so it does not execute these scripts automatically in preview pane. Thanks for the info. -Brad
A+, MCSE NT4, MCDBA SQL7

-Best cartoon of all time :-D 'Spongebob Squarepants' [cook]
 
I just attended a security conference yesterday where we were advised to turn off the Preview pane in Outlook Express, and to save the suspect e-mail with attachment to hard disk (My Documents folder). Then run your anti-virus scan and it will find it, and it can be disinfected. In Outlook Express Tool Bar, you can go to View....Layout...and uncheck "Show preview pane"

You might try these measures. I make no guarantees, as I'm just repeating what was told to me yesterday.
 
I can't find anything called layout..
I have something called tools/options and /read.
But there's nothing in there about previewing.
I'm running Outlook Express 6 ,Swedish.

Where is it?
 
Greyted
Hi Bruno2000 crisc is correct, I got infected and was advised to turn Preview off.
Open OE-> right click on tool bar.
You should see three options, click on customize. This should open up a window that displays the Available Toolbar buttons.
Scroll down in Available Toolbar window, when you see Preview click and highlight.
Then click the Add button, you should see Preview listed in Current Toolbar buttons.
Close Customize Toolbar Window.
You should see the Preview button on your OE toolbar.
Click Preview button once to turn off, the same obviously applies to turn it back on.
Hope this applies in your Swedish OE.
Let us know if this works or helps you
 
Finally ,it worked.
Thanks ,that will save me some reinstalls hopefully.
 
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