Virus and address book

[niis]

I'm trying to understand the way a virus can spread via email and more
exactly where it finds email addresses to send itself to, after
infecting a computer using outlook connected to an exchange server.
I find out that a virus can look for email addresses in files on the
computer and (directly ?) in the user's personal address book.

This brings me to my question : can a virus (directly or through
outlook) retrieve email addresses from an exchange server's shared
address book ? Do you have examples of such a virus ?

Thanks for your help.

 

[Sue Mosher [MVP-Outlook]]

If the virus is able to circumvent Outlook's security, it theoretically would have access to all email addresses visible in Outlook, including those in the Exchange GAL. I know of no recent examples of such viruses, since the security measures Outlook instituted 6 years ago have sent virus developer to easier fields to harvest, such as web pages and files stored on a user's hard drive.

As for direct access, that could theoretically take place through ADSI code, but I think the virus would need to know the name of the server, which is unlikely.

--
Sue Mosher, Outlook MVP
Author of Configuring Microsoft Outlook 2003

and Microsoft Outlook Programming - Jumpstart for
Administrators, Power Users, and Developers