November 22, 2019 2:30pm– We’ve been seeing the spread of a virus/trojan in the Trickbot family.  These are spread using the older Word document format (files ending with .doc).  They are not being spread using the newer Word document format (ending in .docx).   We are temporarily blocking all .doc attachments to try to limit the spread of this trojan.  If you need to send someone a .doc file and you can’t convert it to .docx, we recommend that you put it into a .zip archive first and then send it.    Normally, .doc files can be converted to .docx by just using a version of Word newer than 2003 and saving it as the new format. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.

Update 4:00pm  –  It seems that we have inadvertently blocked .docx files as well even though we explicitly told the system not to.  We are investigating the issue.
Update 4:15pm – We’ve corrected the issue so only .doc files are being blocked as we originally intended.

November 25 – 2:30pm – We do understand that the blocking of .doc files is an inconvenience for some customers and we do apologize.  However, since 6:30am today, we have blocked very close to 3000 of these viruses and have been able to keep at least one customer from spreading this infection.

November 26 – 9:00am – We’ve seen a drastic reduction in the number of .doc files being blocked, so we believe the majority of infected computers have been found/cleaned/quarantined.  Therefore, we have removed the restriction for .doc files.

Update 11:30am – It seems that we were a bit premature at lifting this restriction.  We’ve gotten complaints of this virus continuing to spread, so we’ve applied the restriction to .doc files once again.

December 9, 2019 – 5:00pm – We’re stopping much fewer .doc files now and we feel that many of the ones we are stopping are legitimate (based on tech support contacts).   Therefore, we’ve again lifted the ban on the .doc files.  If we see an uptick of the trojan spreading again, we’ll block them and post updates here.

 

If you have any questions about this temporary policy, please email us at support@internetpro.net or utilize the chat window in the lower right part of your screen.