THE Swindon-based British Computer Society is warning computer users to be more vigilant after the outbreak of the new SoBig-F virus.

The organisation, which is based in Sanford Street, says that the virus is more of a nuisance than a threat to computers, but they say that this does not undermine their seriousness and users should still be wary of opening e-mail attachments.

Spokeswoman for the Society, Victoria Reinthal, said: "We have had no reports of outbreaks of the virus in Swindon, but people should still be aware because the this virus is spreading so fast because of the confusing way in which it is spreading.

"If opened as an attachment on a computer the virus then sends itself to people in the computer's address book, so it makes people who receive the e-mail think it has come from a friend so they open the e-mail."

Tim Bocock, spokesman for train operator First Great Western said: "We have had no problems with these recent viruses. There have been a number of suspect packages trying to make their way through our computer defences but there have been no problems."

Sarah Deacon, of Swindon Council said: "The Borough Council has adequate protection against virus attacks in general, and we haven't had any major problems".

Victoria added: "This is a very clever little virus in the ways that it has confused people. We recommend that people unsure about a particular e-mail to simply delete it.

" It does seem, though, that whoever made this virus does know when to stop as it has an in-built timer, which is scheduled to stop the virus working on September 10."

The virus, as reported in the Evening Advertiser on Thursday, is believed to have started in the United States and it has now spread to around 148 countries, and experts now believe that up to one in every 17 e-mails are infected.

The Sobig F virus spreads by e-mail and by exploiting unsecured network links computers using Windows, so users of Macs and Linux will not be affected. Sobig-F fakes email addresses to hide its origins and it regularly changes its form in the subject line, which makes it very difficult to identify. It is also regularly changing the attachment names, which again, makes it tricky to spot.

E-mail anti-virus software firm MessageLabs stopped over one million copies of the virus in its first 24 hours and it is now the fastest growing virus ever, surpassing the infamous LoveBug, Klez and Kournikova viruses.

The virus is the third major virus to hit computers in a week following outbreaks of the MSBlaster worm and Nachi virus which caused computers to crash and turn-off.

What to do

If infected, users should: disconnect from the Internet and disable the DCOM protocol (Distributed Component Object Model), run a clearing programme, download patches and update anti-virus software.

For instructions about what to do visit the websites at: www.sophos.com and www.symantec.com and www.trendmicro.com