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Issue #199: May 15, 2011

Q: Starting about 3 weeks ago, I started getting the following message when I try to forward an e-mail that has a picture in it: “One or more pictures could not be found.”  I use Windows Live Mail.  I talked with Jeff at CRC Data.  He finally decided that Microsoft had done this on purpose, possibility for protection from viruses.  There so far is not patch.  Have you had this problem and do you know of a fix?  

– H. S.
Fort Walton Beach, Fla

A: Well, despite what that other Jeff may think, I’m fairly certain this is not a vast conspiracy on the part of Microsoft to deny us access to our pictures in the name of protecting us from viruses.  For one thing, viruses that propagate by infecting picture files are extremely rare, and those few known to exist were exploiting vulnerabilities that have long-since been patched.

Like everybody else, I too occasionally have problems receiving pictures.  I generally don’t have any problem sending them, though, because I know how to do it properly.  What I’m saying is that the problem lies with the people who are sending you these pictures.  There are two ways to send pictures in an e-mail: inline (the picture appears in the body of the e-mail) and as an attachment (the picture comes along for the ride, but must be viewed separately from the e-mail).  The problem you are describing happens when someone sends a picture as an inline image, but they send you a link to the picture rather than the picture itself.  Then, if you don’t have access to the location to which the link points (for example, the picture file is located on their computer, or someplace on the Internet they can access but you can’t) you get the above error.  You can get around this by only sending pictures as attachments, rather than inline.  You can also dig through the e-mail configuration for a setting that says “Send pictures from the Internet” which is usually turned OFF by default (thanks, Bill!).  These will fix e-mails you send, but there is little you can do to fix an e-mail you receive.  The sender must do that.

Q:  I’ve had Yahoo Messenger on my computer for years. But only in the last few months have I been besieged by numerous (often three times a day) by requests to become a “friend”.  I’ve gone to Yahoo Messenger’s FAQs to see if there was a way I could block these from coming into my computer, but could not find a solution. There was a question relating to blocking these things, however, it indicated that the answer was no longer available???  Can you be of any help? 

– Bill E.
Bluewater Bay, Fla

A: Welcome to the world of Social Networking SPAM, Bill.  The answer is very simple.  You are getting these requests because your account is configured to allow anyone to send messages to you.  To make them stop, change your account preferences to only allow people who are in your Yahoo contacts to send you messages.  I’m out of space for this week, but you can find step-by-step instructions here: tinyurl.com/628lvz4


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