Beware of e-looters

BBC, September 2 (excerpt):

Computer users are being urged to be on guard for a bogus e-mail that pretends to offer news updates about Hurricane Katrina as a means to infect their PCs.

The malicious e-mail gives a brief news bulletin on the disaster before urging people to click "read more" and be taken to the full story on a website.

Yet once directed to the website, a virus is sent to the user's computer.

People are also being told to watch out for fraudulent e-mail scams pretending to raise cash for Katrina victims.

The separate virus and fake donations bogus e-mails have been discovered by computer security firms SophosLabs and Websense Security Labs.

Don't let a time of tragedy cause you to let down your guard. To borrow from a certain Obiwan, there's a "wretched hive of scum and villainy" out there waiting to prey on goodhearted people on occasions like this (just like they did after the tsunami).