Got the following emails at work in relation to the attack by a virus on the city’s computers. This looks a bit more widespread than “16 computers” as they were claiming to the Chronicle.

PWE Employees,

The City of Houston network is currently experiencing connectivity issues with the following departments/divisions due to a virus outbreak:

* 311 Call Center
* Municipal Courts (Court View Connection)
* Jail Processing Units
* Legal Department
* Parking Management

These departments and divisions have been quarantined and/or isolated by our Information Technology Department who is working diligently to eradicate this problem.

We are asking all PWE users to contact our helpdesk at 713.xxx.xxx, if you experience any problems with your system or if you receive any messages regarding a “Microsoft Installation.” Please do not access Microsoft website for any updates at this time until we receive an “all clear” from Information Technology Department.

If you have a laptop, please ensure your system has the latest updates before your connect to the network.

Thank you for your continued support.

PWE Information Technology Department

The first thing I notice is that the media haven’t said anything about the 311 system. That’s the main call-taking system for non-emergency services. If 311 is compromised, is 911 safe? One hopes they use better security at the HEC, but then, it is the HEC, which has never seemed all that technically savvy.

The second thing I notice is, how do these idiots expect anyone to update their laptop BEFORE connecting to the city’s network? They have to connect to the network to get online! Oh, right, connect to your own network at home and compromise it. Sure. Look, any laptop, anywhere, at any time, is an infection vector because they’re not connected to the network at the time you’re trying to clean it. Since many viruses will spike the update features or spoof AV programs, the odds of an infection never making it back into the network from a hiding place on someone’s laptop are close to nil.

The second email I received Friday said this:

PWE Employees,

Due to the recent virus outbreak that has occurred in various areas in the City; the PWE IT staff is working diligently to ensure the safety of our user community. We are in the process of deploying the necessary security updates to your computer.

We are asking you to shut down your computer before leaving for the day. If you see the option to install updates and shut down please do so.

If you have any questions or concerns, please contact the help desk at 713-xxx-xxxx.

Thank you for your continued support.

PWE Information Technology

I don’t envy our IT people their job right now… I’ve been fighting an unrelated (I think) virus infestation for the last few days, which I wasn’t able to solve until I junked the major commercial solutions and went to Brand X online. (Specifically: AVG antivirus, and I returned to Zone Alarm for my firewall. Screw you Norton, you couldn’t solve it, and left dozens of tracking cookies you were supposed to remove.)

It will be interesting to see if the city can get the problem solved by Monday.