One of the ways that e-mail viruses spread is to use your own computer to send out virus-containing messages to addresses from your address book. The phony, malicious messages may go out using many names in the return address, including your own. Checking the box for the setting outlined above in yellow may at least give you some warning if you become infected. However, not all malicious programs will be caught this way. (This setting is not available in earlier versions of Outlook Express.)

Most e-mail viruses are spread using attachments containing malicious executable files. Checking the box for the outlined entry above will prevent the downloading of a file with any of a variety of executable extensions, such as EXE, VBS, PIF, etc. This will avoid many viruses but it also prevents the downloading of many useful files. Whether an individual uses this setting depends on his or her personal pattern of using e-mail. (This setting is not available in earlier versions of Outlook Express.)

The figure below shows an extra setting for controlling images that was introduced in Windows XP Service Pack 2. This is a measure against Web bugs and other possible HTML hazards. Checking this box will prevent the downloading of pictures or other content fom an external link.

The next page discusses turning off the Preview Pane.