Bloody Virus Hoaxes!!!

This evening, I got the following email from a good friend...

THIS WAS DISCOVERED YESTERDAY BY McAFEE

FW: HUGE VIRUS COMING!!! PLEASE READ & FORWARD

Hi All,I checked with Norton Anti-Virus, and they are gearing up for this virus!
I checked Snopes (URL above:), and it is for real!!
Get this E-mail message sent around to your contacts ASAP.

PLEASE FORWARD THIS WARNING AMONG FRIENDS, FAMILY AND CONTACTS!

You should be alert during the next few days.
Do not open any message with an attachment entitled 'POSTCARD FROM HALLMARK,' regardless of who sent it to you. It is a virus which opens A POSTCARD IMAGE, which 'burns' the whole hard disc C of your computer.This virus will be received from someone who has your e-mail address in his/her contact list. This is the reason why you need to send this e-mail to all your contacts It is better to receivethis message 25 times than to receive the virus and open it.If you receive a mail called' POSTCARD,' even though sent to you by a friend, do not open it! Shut down your computer immediately .This is the worst virus announced by CNN. It has been classified by Microsoft as the most destructive virus ever.

This virus was discovered by McAfee yesterday, and there is no repair yet for this kind of virus. This virus simply destroys the Zero Sector of the Hard Disc, where the vital information is kept.

COPY THIS E-MAIL, AND SEND IT TO YOUR FRIENDS.

REMEMBER: IF YOU SEND ITTO THEM, YOU WILL BENEFIT ALL OF US

This is a hoax! I first saw this email over 6 years ago (so Norton is still gearing up for this virus then? Damn!!!) and basically all this email does is prey on people's paranoia and ignorance of facts. There are various flavours of the email hoax including "An Invitation For You" and "Olympic Torch". Now, I'm not having a go at my friend, she was acting with the best interests, and I fully understand that, but what really bugs me is this is not the first time I have seen this email...and for some strange reason I have a feeling it will not be the last.

If you get this email, please, for the love of Dave....just delete it, it's just another piece of garbage that clogs up people's emails. Passing this on just makes the situation worse...

Here are some links to prove this particular one is a hoax:
http://www.snopes.com/computer/virus/invitation.asp
http://www.symantec.com/business/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid=2006-022115-0852-99&tabid=2