22 Oct 2004
New Baba worm linked to South Korean university, Sophos reports
 |
| The Baba worm contains text referring to
SoonChunHyang University in South Korea. |
Computer virus experts at Sophos have identified that a new
mass-mailing worm may have a link to a university based in South
Korea.
The W32/Baba
worm distributes itself via email claiming to be an mail delivery
error message, but if users click on the attached file the virus
will infect the PC and try to forward itself to other email
addresses found on the computer.
Hidden inside the worm are the phrases "SoonChunHyang" and
"Bucheon", which do not get displayed. The text references the
SoonChunHyang University located in Bucheon, South Korea.
"It's curious that the author of this virus has hidden these
phrases deep within his code," said Graham Cluley, senior
technology consultant for Sophos. "In the past, virus writers have
found it hard not to leave messages inside their code - often
revealing clues as to the possible origin of their creations.
Regardless of the reason why the virus writer did this, all
computer users should ensure they are protected against the latest
email threats."
Although some anti-virus vendors reported that this virus was a
variant of the Netsky worm, it bears no relation to that family of
worms.
Sophos recommends companies protect their email gateways with a
consolidated solution to thwart the virus
and spam threats as well as secure their desktop and servers with
automatically updated anti-virus protection.
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.