Virus researchers at Sophos are warning users to beware of the
latest Bagle worm, Bagle-AQ, which burst
onto the scene late yesterday.
Bagle-AQ spreads as an email with a blank subject line and the
message text 'new price'. Attached is one of a number of ZIP files
all of which also refer to 'price'. If run, the worm attempts to
download a copy of Bagle-AQ from a number of websites, and the
download is repeated every ten hours.
"The Bagle worms in all their various guises are becoming a real
pain in the neck for the world's computer users - this is the 43rd
variant," said Carole Theriault, security consultant, Sophos. "We
received a huge number of reports in the first few hours of it
being the wild, suggesting that Bagle-AQ was spammed out."
"This worm might seem easy to spot because of the blank subject
line, but up-to-date anti-virus software will ensure that computers
will be protected from it, even when it travels at break-neck
speeds. We have seen many viruses dupe users into double-clicking
with the promise of scantily clad celebrities, but this one relies
on good old curiosity," continued Theriault.
Sophos recommends that all unsolicited emails are treated with
caution.
Sophos is headquartered in Boston, US and Oxford, UK. More information is available at www.sophos.com.