unwated (virus?) messages on messenger

I use adium most of the time (sometimes amsn) and now I'm getting messages like "hey! want a free dating site with no hold backs? meet someone local today that wants the same thing you do at" and then a link is provided. I get one of these everyday, from an address which I don't even have on my contact list.

Is this a virus or trojan or something? What do I do?

 

What happens if you block that address?

 

I get another message from another random address some time later.

 

Probably viruses spread through multiple ignorant Windoze users... *sigh* I get that all the time in Emesene. I just ignore it.

 

I thought that perhaps I have the virus. Oh goody if I don't have it.

 

Just dont click on any links that may be in the IM, and you should be good. I used to get them a lot on an old Yahoo messenger s/n

 

Have you run malware scans yet, just to make sure it isn't simply spam? I doubt your machine is infected, but if this issue were mine, I'd scan just to be sure the machine is clean.

 

They are spam. MSN is probably the worst offender when it comes to spam. You don't have a virus.

 

Yeah, it's common MSN spam. Everyone gets them so it's nothing to be worried about.

 

Cool, thanks. I was worried.

When I had a PC, I have 10000 different anti-virus and malware and what not programs that I would run. Actually, every month, i would go through a 5-10 hour scanning process. It was very detailed, from scanning online to running some programs on window's safe mode.

But I haven't run a single anti-virus or anti-malware or trojan program since I got this macbook. Nothing. Do I need to? If so, what are some good and common programs?

 

I never get any spam on msn.....but I get it always on yahoo, which I simply ignore

 

I use to get them on yahoo i think. Never on AIM or MSN. But i dont use MSN that much.

 

I don't know about Yahoo, but on MSN Messenger the *default* behavior is to not allow anyone to send you messages if you have not added them to your "allow" list. So unless the OP has changed this setting (or isn't actually on the MSN chat network, or is on it with another networks), they should not be getting IM's from random accounts.

 

nope, i haven't changed the setting. But I'm not using MSN Messenger. I'm using adium.

 

I completely missed that you were discussing OSX, so no, you don't need to do anything except ignore the spam. I read your question and missed the forum in which you were posting. FWIW, I've never had malware of any sort on my Macs. Sorry for posting such a short-sighted response.