Sophos, a world leader in protecting businesses against spam and
viruses, is warning of a new variant of the Netsky worm called
W32/Netsky-C.
It has already received several reports of this worm spreading in
the wild.
The worm spreads via email - forwarding itself to email
addresses found on the hard drives of infected computers - and via
file sharing networks such as Kazaa and the ICQ chat system.
When sent via email the worm uses a wide variety of filenames,
subject lines and message bodies. But when spreading via file
sharing networks the worm poses as a mixture of patches, music,
hacks, cracks and pornography. Filenames which can be used by the
worm include:
Porno Screensaver.scr
Teen Porn 16.jpg.pif
Full album.mp3.pif
How to hack.doc.exe
Microsoft Office 2003 Crack.exe
Microsoft WinXP Crack.exe
The Sims 3 crack.exe
Virii Sourcecode.scr
XXX hardcore pic.jpg.exe
"No-one deserves to be hit by a worm like Netsky-C - but
computer users need to take some responsibility for the protection
of their own data. Don't make it easy for the virus writers by
being tempted into downloading and running programs which claim to
be hacks, cracks and seedy porn," said Graham Cluley, senior
technology consultant at Sophos. "Companies should ensure their
anti-virus protection is up-to-date to prevent Netsky-C from
spreading across their systems, and ensure all users are familiar
with safe computing best practice."
Curiously, the Netsky-C worm contains the following text
embedded in its code:
<-<- we are the skynet - you can't hide yourself! - we
kill malware writers (they have no chance!) -
[LaMeRz-->]MyDoom.F is a thief of our idea! - -< SkyNet AV
vs. Malware >- ->->
Further reading:
Further information
and protection against W32/Netsky-C
More than 100 million users in 150 countries rely on Sophos as the best protection against complex threats and data loss. Sophos is committed to providing security and data protection solutions that are simple to manage, deploy and use and that deliver the industry's lowest total cost of ownership. Sophos offers award-winning encryption, endpoint security, web, email, and network access control solutions backed by SophosLabs - a global network of threat intelligence centers. With more than two decades of experience, Sophos is regarded as a leader in security and data protection by top analyst firms and has received many industry awards.
Sophos is headquartered in Boston, US and Oxford, UK. More information is available at www.sophos.com.