Security news
Security news21 February 2005
Deja vu as worm rekindles old love letter trick, Sophos reports on Assiral email virus
Experts at SophosLabs™, Sophos's global network of virus and spam analysis centres, have discovered an email virus which poses as a love letter almost five years since the original VBS/Lovelet worm (also known as ILOVEYOU or The Love Bug) used a similar trick to fool computer users around the world.
The W32/Assiral-A worm spreads via email with the following characteristics:
-
Subject: Re: LOV YA!
Body: Kindly read and reply to my LOVE LETTER in the attachments :-)
Attachment: LOVE_LETTER.TXT.exe
 |
| A typical message sent by the W32/Assiral-A worm. |
If an unsuspecting user launches the attached file the worm will attempt to copy itself to other computers, and open a webpage hosted at Geocities.
 |
| The worm opens a webpage hosted at Geocities. |
Additionally, the worm will drop a file containing the following text onto the infected computer:
-
Greetz from LARISSA.B!
I will survive,
In this moment in time.
You computer will crash,
So, you will be mine.
I never crash,
I never fail.
So, in this moment in time,
I will surive...
- LARISSA AUTHOR - 5-15-05
 |
| The message dropped by the W32/Assiral-A worm. |
"The Assiral worm uses an old trick to seduce users into believing they may have received a romantic love letter," said Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant for Sophos. "It's almost five years since the infamous Love Bug worm fooled millions of Windows users around the world using a similar tactic - and it seems unlikely that Assiral will have anything like as much impact."
Sophos recommends companies protect their email gateways with a consolidated solution to defend against viruses and spam. Businesses should also secure their desktop and servers with automatically updated protection.
