Instead, expect a virus that already has affected hundreds of thousands and could contaminate your computer. But an N.C. State University graduate has set up a Web page to help stop the virus from doing any more damage.
The virus, known as Hybris, spreads by sending itself as a message attachment to everyone the victim e-mails.
Though the virus itself does no immediate damage, an infected computer puts itself at the mercy of the virus writer.
"The scary thing about this virus is that it's possible (for the virus writer) to write a plug-in for the virus," said Casey Blackburn, a 1999 N.C. State graduate, who has set up a Web site to inform people about Hybris.
It is unknown if the writer of the virus has written any plug-ins that could do damage to an infected computer.
But because of the potential damage the virus could cause, Hybris has earned a classification of "severe" from antivirus firm Norton Utilities.
Blackburn, a network administrator for a Raleigh-based company, first noticed Hybris last month during a virus alert circulated at work. He said he became suspicious when he saw the "sexyfun.net" domain on the infected e-mail. "I went to the (sexyfun.net) Web page and found out it didn't exist," he said. "That was the first clue that the return address was fake."
After finding out that the sexyfun.net domain was not registered, Blackburn registered it himself. Since its Dec. 11 launch, Blackburn's site has logged more than 130,000 hits, mostly from others suspicious of the domain name.
"Nine times out of 10, people find this Web site because they are trying to find out about the e-mail," Blackburn said.
