Good afternoon. I am a Macintosh technical consultant in Ithaca, New York, where two Cornell University students were arrested last month for allegedly creating and releasing the MBDF virus. I've been asked to assist in collecting some information for an ongoing investigation being conducted by Investigator Scott Hamilton of Cornell's Department of Public Safety.
IF YOU WERE DIRECTLY AFFECTED by the MBDF virus, please send me a detailed description of the damages and expenses incurred. See below for details of what I need to know.
IF YOU WERE NOT DIRECTLY AFFECTED by the MBDF virus, please don't reply to this message. If you have been affected by other viruses, but not MBDF, please don't reply to this message. If you are not sure whether your computer was infected with MBDF, please obtain a current Macintosh anti-virus utility (such as Disinfectant 2.6 or Virus Detective 5.0.2) and check carefully.
Investigator Hamilton needs concrete information about damages and expenses that were incurred as a direct result of the MBDF virus. He needs:
Monetary expenses resulting from lost time expressed in DOLLAR VALUE (or other currency if not US) of the time or lost business expressed in value of the lost business, that is directly due to MBDF;
The monetary value of YOUR TIME required to remove an MBDF infection or repair damage caused by MBDF;
Monetary expenses incurred having a paid consultant or dealer remove an MBDF infection or repair damage caused by MBDF;
Monetary expenses incurred obtaining new anti-virus utilities (buying commercial ones, paying to update commercial ones, paying shareware fees, or downloading freeware or shareware utilities from a pay service) for the express purpose of removing an MBDF infection, NOT for protection "just in case";
Monetary expenses resulting from time needed to recreate data lost due to MBDF;
Other damages that can be documented.
He can NOT consider expenses resulting from efforts to protect your computer or computers from the virus if an infection was not present. Please do not write unless you were actually directly affected by MBDF.
In addition to the above, we need:
Your name and company name (if applicable)
Your e-mail address
Your complete postal address
Your telephone number
Investigator Hamilton may need to get in touch with you for additional information, so please be sure to provide all of the above.
Please send this information to me (Mark H. Anbinder) via Internet email. If that is not feasible, please send it to me via postal mail at the below address, or to:
Investigator Scott Hamilton
Department of Public Safety
Barton Hall
Cornell University
Ithaca, New York 14853 USA
If you know of anyone who was affected by the MBDF virus, please pass this message along to them.
I will do my best to reply to all messages I receive, but please understand if I don't do so right away. :-) Thanks for your assistance!
Mark H. Anbinder
BAKA Computers, Inc.
200 Pleasant Grove Road
Ithaca, NY 14850