Can opening e-mail messages with certain subject lines really infect my computer with a virus or worm?
With very few exceptions, you cannot get a virus by simply opening and reading an e-mail message. A virus or worm must be executed, or “run,” to infect a computer. Simply downloading or receiving the file in an e-mail usually will have no immediate effect. The exception is HTML-formatted e-mail, which can contain scripts that execute automatically upon opening. Nonetheless, relying on e-mailed warnings that tell you to watch out for messages with certain subject lines is foolhardy. Viruses change as they circulate, often using a variety of subject lines or stealing their subjects from files on an infected computer.
