Fwd: worm stopper

[WMSteed@aol.com]

Anyone know if the following, which was forwarded to me, will actually work?

Walter Steed

<<I  learned of a computer trick that's really ingenious in its
simplicity. 

As you may know, when/if a worm virus gets into your computer it
heads 
straight for your email address book and sends itself to everyone in
there, thus 
infecting all your friends and associates.  This trick won't keep
the virus 
from getting into your computer, but it will stop it from using your
address 
book to spread further, and it will alert you to the fact that the
worm has 
gotten into your system. 

Here's what you do: first, open your address book and click on "new
contact" 
just as you would do if you were adding a new friend to your list of
email 
addresses.  In the window where you would type your friend's first
name, 
type in !000 (that's an exclamation mark followed by 3 zeros).  In
the window 
below where it prompts you to enter the new email address, type in
WormAlert. (If it 
tells you this is not a valid address just say yes to add it, or
ok).  Then 
complete everything by clicking add, enter, ok, etc. 

Now, here's what you've done and why it works: the "name" !000 will
be placed 
at the top of your address book as entry #1.  This will be where the
worm will 
start in an effort to send itself to all your friends.  But when it
tries to 
send itself to !000, it will be undeliverable because of the phony
email 
address you entered (WormAlert).  If the first attempt fails (which
it will 
because of the phony address), the worm goes no further and your
friends will 
not be infected. 

Here's the second great advantage of this method: if an email cannot
be 
delivered, you will be notified of this in your InBox almost
immediately. 
Hence, if you ever get an email telling you that an email addressed
to 
WormAlert could not be delivered, you know right away that you have
the worm 
virus in your system. You can then take steps to get rid of it!>>