Russian mail order bride Svetlana invaded OU email accounts Tuesday desperately seeking true love. Some students have said their computers run slower after opening the email and its attachments. Photo Provided

An online dating service managed to send a mass e-mail to OU students and faculty Tuesday disguised as a letter from a single Russian woman named “Svetlana.”

The e-mail, which appears to be in the form of a letter from a 27-year-old woman describing a life of hardship who is desperately seeking true love, came into OU Exchange accounts Tuesday morning.

Some students said the two attachments bundled with the e-mail have made their computers run slower. One attachment is a picture of the purported love-sick author, and another is a description of the woman which describes her as a dental assistant who is artistic, athletic and a graduate of medical school.

“We get over 3 million known spam or malicious e-mails a day, and 90 percent of them are usually blocked by our spam filter and never make it to anyone’s account,” OU IT spokesman Nick Key said. “The junk e-mail filter did a good job with [this mass e-mail] and most people left it alone because it went right to their junk e-mail box.”

Key said the reason why some students might experience a slow down in the speed of their computers is because they may be a victim of something that they did not actually see as a part of the e-mail.

“You should never click on a suspicious e-mail, and if you have opened it, then you should never open an attachment to a suspicious e-mail,” Key said. “Your computer could become a hub for spam e-mail, viruses could run undetected in the background in your computer and you could also be the victim of phishing.”

OU IT will be upgrading to a new e-mail system, Exchange 2010, in July. The new program will “enhance spam identification and better manage spam e-mails,” Key explained.

He also said there are limits to sending mass e-mail through OU Exchange.

“OU has a strict mass e-mail policy,” Key said. “Attachments are not allowed along with other restrictions. Because of the nature of the e-mail, we can see that it did not come from OU. IT is looking into the origin of the e-mail, and we are trying to attempt to stop future transmissions from the sender.”