Macro warning message and unable to attach documents to emails

[samantha.pillion]

I am a new Mac user and I am having a lot of problems with my
Microsoft Word 2004 (Student and teacher edition). In the beginning
there were no macro warning messages and I had no difficulty attaching
any of my documents to an email. More recently, however, almost every
time I open any word document a macro warning message appears and
whenever I attempt to attach any of these word documents to an email,
in both Gmail and Yahoo, it says that it is unable to attach it
because it contains a virus. I have tried copying and pasting the
contents of a word document into another blank one and then attaching
to an email and that does not work either.

I do not have any virus protection/detection software as I do not know
which kinds are compatible with macs and I do not want to buy anything
because my college will be providing one in August.

Also, I have read through this group trying to find this problem
already answered and it appears all of the macro problems involve
people who actively make and use macros. I, however, have no idea what
they are or how to create them, so I fear this may be a macro virus
and I have no idea how to get rid of it. Any help would be much
appreciated.

Thanks,

Samantha

 

[Elliott Roper]

I am a new Mac user and I am having a lot of problems with my
Microsoft Word 2004 (Student and teacher edition). In the beginning
there were no macro warning messages and I had no difficulty attaching
any of my documents to an email. More recently, however, almost every
time I open any word document a macro warning message appears and
whenever I attempt to attach any of these word documents to an email,
in both Gmail and Yahoo, it says that it is unable to attach it
because it contains a virus. I have tried copying and pasting the
contents of a word document into another blank one and then attaching
to an email and that does not work either.

I do not have any virus protection/detection software as I do not know
which kinds are compatible with macs and I do not want to buy anything
because my college will be providing one in August.

Also, I have read through this group trying to find this problem
already answered and it appears all of the macro problems involve
people who actively make and use macros. I, however, have no idea what
they are or how to create them, so I fear this may be a macro virus
and I have no idea how to get rid of it. Any help would be much
appreciated.

It does look like your Word environment and your Word documents are
infected with a macro virus.
In practical terms, this is the only kind of virus that spreads on a
Macintosh. I have never heard of their influence spreading outside of
Microsoft Office on Macintosh, but as you have discovered, they leave
it acting like a Typhoid Mary of the computer world - transmitting
disease to those less fortunate souls not running OS X.

I suspect the only way to deal with that mess without an antivirus tool
is to delete the "Normal" file in ~/Documents/Microsoft User Data/ and
all your Word documents, empty trash, and restart your Mac before
restarting Word or any other Office product. The restart should cause
your Mac to forget about a sneaky temporary file copy of your Normal
that may lurk on your machine.

If you save fresh copies of your documents as RTF (Rich Text Format)
before you start that procedure, you may be able to convert them back
to virus-free Word docs afterwards. I don't think RTF files can harbour
a macro virus, but I have no first hand knowledge of that.

There has been a lot of discussion about Word macro viruses on Mac in
this newsgroup. Google groups advanced search will dig it up.
Try this:
http://groups.google.com/groups?as_q=&num=10&scoring=r&as_epq=macro+viru
s&as_oq=&as_eq=&as_ugroup=microsoft.public.mac.office.word&as_usubject=&
as_uauthors=&lr=lang_en&as_drrb=q&as_qdr=&as_mind=1&as_minm=1&as_miny=19
81&as_maxd=19&as_maxm=6&as_maxy=2007&safe=off

That ghastly url is that of the the search results for exact phrase
"macro virus"
over group microsoft.public.mac.office.word
at http://groups.google.com/advanced_group_search

Not everyone agrees on causes and remedies as you will see. Indeed some
of the more pessimistic authors there would claim my procedure was
ineffective. I'd be interested in your results.

 

[CyberTaz]

Hi Samantha -

Sorry you're having problems, but I'm sure you'll find a solution here

Viruses aren't commomplace on Macs, but that doesn't mean they can't be
found... and it doesn't mean that files on a Mac can't be contaminated.
However, they are unlikely to spread & cause damage on the local system,
although they might be lethal if shipped to a PC.

The message doesn't necessarily mean that there is a virus, either. The
warning can be triggered by any number of other things that a "virus
checker" doesn't understand & therefore *assumes* is a virus - the old
"better to err on the side of caution" mentality. Unfortunately, many of the
email servers out there don't understand Macs very well If the files
you're getting the message from are attachments you've received from Windows
users that could explain the message, as you may have received files that
_are_ infected.

First, make sure that any Word files you create ae saved with a check in the
box (Save As dialog) to Append File Extensions.

Second, be certain you're email software is set to send "PC-friendly"
attachments - the wording & location will vary depending on the email
program.

Third, it's a good idea to use the Zip&Mail or Sit/Sitx&Mail feature of OS X
or use StuffIt to compress the file before attaching. That not only helps
get it _out_ but also helps insure that the server software on the
recipient's end doesn't mangle the attachment once it gets there.

Additionally there are some free virus programs which you can download from:

http://www.versiontracker.com/php/q...srchArea=macosx|macosx-all&by=rating&dir=desc

ClamXAV and Intego VirusBarrierX are two of the more commonly recommended.
You might need to use one of them to cleanse your existing files so you
don't spread the bugs in docs you send out (if, indeed, any of your current
files are actually infected).

 

[samantha.pillion]

Thanks for your help. I downloaded ClamXAV and it found 11 infected
files. I then did everything that the post before yours said to do.
ClamXAV can only quarantine the files, is there a way to fix them?

I also could not find the Zip&Mail or Sit/Stix&Mail feature of OS X,
is it in the application Mail? I also could not find any mention of
sending PC-friendly emails in my Gmail account...

Oh, and the Word files are already saved with Append file extensions.

After doing and checking all of that, Gmail still claims that the
files contain viruses.

Any other suggestions would be much appreciated. Should I continue to
look in the online discussion groups or should I just call Mac
support?

 

[CyberTaz]

Elliott's quite right about the entanglement & the discrepancies in how to
go about the remedial process. I believe his suggestions are as good as any
and better than most. As long as Normal isn't contaminated you should be
able to salvage your files as new docs with a minimal amount of loss -
although it will take some time. Fortunately there are only a few files
involved, so it should be relatively painless

Another thought - which may or may not work - is to copy all but the last ¶
of a doc & paste into a new blank doc. Unfortunately, I don't know of any
cost-free program that will "cure" the afflicted files.

Re the zipping: If you right-click (Control-Click) a file in a Finder
window, go to the Mail listing & follow your nose it will create a
zipped/stuffed attachment & take you into your email software. Or you can
zip/stuff the file first & attach that to a message.

I'm not familiar with Gmail, but I doubt that it offers anything along those
lines (compatibility settings) since it is a "generic" public facility. Do
you not use a local Mac-specific email client (such as Apple Mail or MS
Entourage)? Thats where you'll find the PC-friendly setting.

 

[samantha.pillion]

I cannot thank you both enough. Somehow, that last-ditch attempt of
copying and pasting everything into new word documents (after getting
rid of the corrupted Normal file) worked! I can now attach all of the
Word documents to an email. For awhile there I was doubting my
decision to switch over to Macs, however, I knew that there was a lot
of support out there from places other than the apple website.

Thank you both so much!

Samantha

 

[samantha.pillion]

I cannot thank you both enough. Somehow, that last-ditch attempt of
copying and pasting everything into new word documents (after getting
rid of the corrupted Normal file) worked! I can now attach all of the
Word documents to an email. For awhile there I was doubting my
decision to switch over to Macs, however, I knew that there was a lot
of support out there from places other than the apple website.

Thank you both so much!

Samantha

 

[Clive Huggan]

Just to aid your understanding of that often perplexing but marvellous
product called Word, Samantha, I can explain the "somehow" that you referred
to.

Pasting everything except the last paragraph mark into a new blank document
forces Word to repair the document¹s internal structure. This procedure
often solves corruption problems because the document properties stored
invisibly behind the final paragraph mark are the elements most likely to be
corrupted. The new blank document provides a clean set of document
properties, unaffected by the problem in your previous document.

Cheers,

Clive Huggan
Canberra, Australia
(My time zone is 5-11 hours different from North America and Europe, so my
follow-on responses to those regions can be delayed)
============================================================
* SUGGESTION -- KEEP REVISITING AFTER YOU POST: If you post a question, keep
re-visiting the newsgroup for several days after the first response comes
in. Sometimes it takes a few responses before the best or complete solution
is provided; sometimes you'll be asked for further information. Good tips
about getting the best out of posting are at
http://word.mvps.org/Mac/AccessNewsgroups.html and
http://word.mvps.org/FindHelp/Posting.htm (if you use Safari you may see a
blank page and have to hit the circular arrow icon -- "Reload the current
page" -- two or more times).
============================================================

 

[Phillip Jones]

It does look like your Word environment and your Word documents are
infected with a macro virus.
In practical terms, this is the only kind of virus that spreads on a
Macintosh. I have never heard of their influence spreading outside of
Microsoft Office on Macintosh, but as you have discovered, they leave
it acting like a Typhoid Mary of the computer world - transmitting
disease to those less fortunate souls not running OS X.

I suspect the only way to deal with that mess without an antivirus tool
is to delete the "Normal" file in ~/Documents/Microsoft User Data/ and
all your Word documents, empty trash, and restart your Mac before
restarting Word or any other Office product. The restart should cause
your Mac to forget about a sneaky temporary file copy of your Normal
that may lurk on your machine.

If you save fresh copies of your documents as RTF (Rich Text Format)
before you start that procedure, you may be able to convert them back
to virus-free Word docs afterwards. I don't think RTF files can harbour
a macro virus, but I have no first hand knowledge of that.

There has been a lot of discussion about Word macro viruses on Mac in
this newsgroup. Google groups advanced search will dig it up.
Try this:
http://groups.google.com/groups?as_q=&num=10&scoring=r&as_epq=macro+viru
s&as_oq=&as_eq=&as_ugroup=microsoft.public.mac.office.word&as_usubject=&
as_uauthors=&lr=lang_en&as_drrb=q&as_qdr=&as_mind=1&as_minm=1&as_miny=19
81&as_maxd=19&as_maxm=6&as_maxy=2007&safe=off

That ghastly url is that of the the search results for exact phrase
"macro virus"
over group microsoft.public.mac.office.word
at http://groups.google.com/advanced_group_search

Not everyone agrees on causes and remedies as you will see. Indeed some
of the more pessimistic authors there would claim my procedure was
ineffective. I'd be interested in your results.

Yes, Macro-Viruses are the only cross Platform Viruses in existence
between Macs and PC's this is because the virus is in the coding of the
Macro language which is exactly the same between Mac's and PC's. This
has been known for a decade or more. It was known back in the days of
Word 6.0.l.a which was a carbon copy clone of the Windows 95 version on
PC. (you could open both and hide the machines and no one could tell the
difference. only short-cut keys were different.)

--
------------------------------------------------------------------------
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616 Liberty Street |Who's Who. PHONE:276-632-5045, FAX:276-632-0868
Martinsville Va 24112 |[email protected], ICQ11269732, AIM pjonescet
------------------------------------------------------------------------

If it's "fixed", don't "break it"!

mailto[email protected]

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[Phillip Jones]

It does look like your Word environment and your Word documents are
infected with a macro virus.
In practical terms, this is the only kind of virus that spreads on a
Macintosh. I have never heard of their influence spreading outside of
Microsoft Office on Macintosh, but as you have discovered, they leave
it acting like a Typhoid Mary of the computer world - transmitting
disease to those less fortunate souls not running OS X.

I suspect the only way to deal with that mess without an antivirus tool
is to delete the "Normal" file in ~/Documents/Microsoft User Data/ and
all your Word documents, empty trash, and restart your Mac before
restarting Word or any other Office product. The restart should cause
your Mac to forget about a sneaky temporary file copy of your Normal
that may lurk on your machine.

If you save fresh copies of your documents as RTF (Rich Text Format)
before you start that procedure, you may be able to convert them back
to virus-free Word docs afterwards. I don't think RTF files can harbour
a macro virus, but I have no first hand knowledge of that.

There has been a lot of discussion about Word macro viruses on Mac in
this newsgroup. Google groups advanced search will dig it up.
Try this:
http://groups.google.com/groups?as_q=&num=10&scoring=r&as_epq=macro+viru
s&as_oq=&as_eq=&as_ugroup=microsoft.public.mac.office.word&as_usubject=&
as_uauthors=&lr=lang_en&as_drrb=q&as_qdr=&as_mind=1&as_minm=1&as_miny=19
81&as_maxd=19&as_maxm=6&as_maxy=2007&safe=off

That ghastly url is that of the the search results for exact phrase
"macro virus"
over group microsoft.public.mac.office.word
at http://groups.google.com/advanced_group_search

Not everyone agrees on causes and remedies as you will see. Indeed some
of the more pessimistic authors there would claim my procedure was
ineffective. I'd be interested in your results.

this is the reason since I found out about the problem I disabled
Macros and have never ever used them and I have set to block documents
That use macros.
--
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Phillip M. Jones, CET |LIFE MEMBER: VPEA ETA-I, NESDA, ISCET, Sterling
616 Liberty Street |Who's Who. PHONE:276-632-5045, FAX:276-632-0868
Martinsville Va 24112 |[email protected], ICQ11269732, AIM pjonescet
------------------------------------------------------------------------

If it's "fixed", don't "break it"!

mailto[email protected]

<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/default.htm>
<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/90th_Birthday/index.htm>
<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/Fulcher/default.html>
<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/Harris/default.htm>
<http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/Jones/default.htm>

<http://www.vpea.org>