Weird Email Tracking: Possible Virus, Possibly SPAM?

From: pheidippides (paul_at_seismicom.net)
Date: 10/29/04 

Date: Fri, 29 Oct 2004 15:48:40 -0700

ExAdmins:

A received a strange email today from the System Adminstrator, you know, one of those "messsage undeliverable" receipts. The weird part is she never sent an email out to the intended recipient.

here's how it plays out:
FROM: System Administrator
TO: Jane Jones
SUBJECT: Undeliverable: Re: Thanks :)

Your message did not reach some or all of the intended recipients.
Subject: Re: Thanks :)
Sent: 10/29/2004 1:52 PM
The following recipient(s) could not be reached:
shannon@fishfry.com on 10/29/2004 12:47 PM
The e-mail account does not exist at the organization this message was sent to. Check the e-mail address, or contact the recipient directly to find out the correct address.
<hal.corp.fishfry.com #5.1.1>

I checked the virus logs for her computer account, we use SAV Corporate Edition v9. No recent entries indicating virus activity scanning her Outlook addressbook nor auto-propagating hidden emails.

Then I ran the message tracking tool. Bingo! A message bearing the same subject line to the same address was sent right around the time of this "undeliverable" timestamp. So I looked at the user's SENT ITEMS folder...nothing.

So the question remains. Just where did this email originate? If not from the user's mailbox, then how does it even register in Message Tracking? Is this a spoof? Is this a virus propagating itself?

so many questions, so little time to answer them....

pheidippides

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