[plug] complacency: viruses and spam

[sol]

The discussion on viruses jilted my complacency. I've been running Linux 
for nearly two years now - I never use 'doze or Outlook, etc - and have 
barely given a thought to virus protection. Whilst I understand how and 
why Linux is safer than 'doze, it's still not totally safe, and there is 
the potential for malicious viruses aimed at Linux to arise in the future.

My question is: What are the "standard" precautions that one should take 
to defend against viruses on Linux?

On a tenuously related matter, I got my second spam yesterday (in two 
years - thankyou Linux!). The first was from Red Hat a year ago after 
visiting their site, the second one was came as a result of my address 
being harvested from a webpage I posted (I think). From here I suppose 
it can only get worse. I set up a filter in Mozilla-mail, but it seems 
to me excessive to set up a filter for everytime one is spammed. What do 
pluggers do in general to filter (or whatever) spam? (A D.O.S attack on 
the spammer crossed my mind. :-) )

ta,
sol