Outlook Express & Windows Mail
Historically, e-mail has been a favorite means of transporting malicious code. This makes your e-mail program the logical place to start beefing up the security of your computer. The first step is to disable viewing e-mail in HTML. This is accomplished in Outlook Express by clicking on "Tools" in the top line menu then click on "Options".
When the "Options" dialog opens click the "Read" tab.
In the resulting screen make sure there is a check in the "Read messages in plain text" box. Click the "Apply" button at the bottom of the dialog then click "OK". This Procedure does not require a system reboot and is easily reversible should you decide to view the e-mail as it was sent.
For a belt and suspenders approach turn off the preview pane, which is also an easily performed adjustment. When Outlook Express opens, the Preview pane automatically opens a message for viewing. The message that is opened could easily be from an unknown sender and contain malicious code. This is not a problem when mail is read in plain text, however, there are times when users will prefer to view the message in it's native format and will deactivate the plain text option. Even the most careful of users can forget to reactivate the plain text security option. Closing the Preview pane provides the security needed in these cases. With Outlook Express open, click on "In Box" to open the message list screen. Next click on "View" then select "Layout".
In the "Window Layout Properties" dialog box clear the check mark from the "Show preview pane" check box click "Apply" then click "OK". This dialog can be opened from the Outlook Express title screen, however, the Preview Pane options portion is only active when accessed from one of the message sub-folders such as the "In-Box".
Although this article was written and published prior to the release of Windows Vista, the steps outlined here can also be applied to Windows Mail, the e-mail client provided with Windows Vista.
Microsoft, Microsoft Office, Windows, Windows XP and Windows Vista are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. Other names have been included in the above text that are trademarks of the respective companies.
