03 Aug 2004
Hackers reach new low with claims Nick Berg is alive, Sophos reports on latest Trojan horse disguise
 |
| Nick Berg was brutally killed in Iraq, but
hackers are claiming he is alive in order to spread a Trojan
horse |
Experts at Sophos are warning computer users that a file
claiming to contain video footage showing that American captive
Nick Berg is alive and well in Iraq actually contains the same
Trojan (Troj/Hackarmy-A) which
posed as a suicide note from Arnold Schwarzenegger and photographs
claiming Osama Bin Laden had killed himself.
The latest message, posted to tens of thousands of internet
newsgroups, claims that Aljazeera has released video footage of the
beheaded American alive and well. This message reads as
follows:
Conspiracy theories of Nick Berg being alive and well in
Iraq have today been proven true. Aljazeera have released video
footage of the supposedly beheaded American captive. The clip was
first "discovered" on an Islamic website in Malaysia and has now
been released by American Journalists collaborating with Aljazeera.
The evidence speaks for itself and viewed firsthand here.
<url removed>
"Duping innocent users into believing that Nick Berg is in fact
alive shows hackers stooping to a new low," said Graham Cluley,
senior technology consultant at Sophos. "This gruesome
insensitivity is a despicable ploy to get curious computer users to
download malicious files. The people behind Hackarmy are well
versed in using morbid tricks to entice unsuspecting users - having
recently claimed that Arnold Schwarzenegger and
Osama Bin Laden
were dead. This time, in an attempt to infect yet more PCs, they've
resorted to claims that someone who was brutally killed is in fact
alive."
Nick Berg was beheaded by Iraqi insurgents earlier this year who
said they were avenging the Iraqi prisoners abused at Abu Ghraib
jail by American soldiers. A video of Berg's gruesome death was
broadcast on an Arabic website.
Sophos continues to recommend that computer users practise
safe computing and keep
their anti-virus and firewall defences up-to-date.
About Sophos
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.