Clerk Brown's office posts virus warning

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Visitors to the website of Cook County Circuit Court Clerk Dorothy Brown may have noticed the warning reproduced above in recent days. In case you're reading this post on a device that doesn't have a screen large enough to make that snippet legible, here is what the notice says:

IMPORTANT WARNING REGARDING “COURT HEARING” EMAIL SCAM

Please be aware that there is an email scam currently targeting individuals with the following subject line: “Hearing of your case in Court (followed by a number).” The email has an ATTACHMENT, which, if opened, CONTAINS A MALICIOUS COMPUTER VIRUS that will infect your Windows computer. This message is NOT sent by any Court. DO NOT OPEN under any circumstance, DELETE IT from your mailbox.

More information about this virus can be found at: http://www.onlinethreatalerts.com/article/2013/12/23/hearing-of-your-case-in-court-nr-virus-emails.

If you follow the link provided on Clerk Brown's website you will see that this warning does not stem from any compromise in the online notification system that we were all required to sign up for just last year. The Clerk's office is simply providing this warning as a public service for attorneys and others who may not be wise in the ways of technology.

Still... no virus has ever compromised any of the paper files in my office. I have spilled the occasional cup of coffee, but the resulting stains don't necessarily compromise the information stored on the printed pages. I embrace the brave new digital world -- I'm out here in the Ether with you, aren't I? -- but my love of technology is not unconditional. I still worry that so much of our personal and business and professional lives is just one power surge away from destruction, or else at the mercy of some bright, but bored, teenager in Eastern Europe. I don't think that makes me a Luddite, does it?