Half-million PCs possible infected by Kama Sutra Blackmail e-mail virus

[mandy]

A worm claiming to offers pictures from the Kama Sutra has begun circulating by email in the latest attempt by virus writers to infect Windows machines by relying on a combination of user stupidity and supposedly salacious content.

The Nyxem-D worm (AKA Blackmal-E) arrives as the infectious payload of email messages with spoofed sender addresses claiming to offer obscene pictures or pornographic movie clips. Subject lines used in the malicious emails include: The Best Videoclip Ever, Fw: SeX.mpg, Miss Lebanon 2006 and Fuckin Kama Sutra pics. The worm only affects Windows PCs.

full article: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/01/19/...utra_worm/

[mandy]

update:

A mass-mailing computer virus that is coded to delete files on February 3 may have spread to more than 500,000 servers, if evidence from a Web counter can be trusted.

Known as the Blackmal.E or Nyxem.E virus, the program travels as an attachment to e-mail messages with suggestive subject lines such as "School girl fantasies gone bad" and "Re: Sex Video". The virus will completely compromise systems whose users open the attachment, attempting to disable security software and making extensive changes to the registry.

...Computers that remain infected on February 3 will have a eleven types of data deleted from the hard drive, including any Word, Excel, PowerPoint or PDF documents.

full article: http://www.securityfocus.com/brief/113

[mandy]

Microsoft Monday posted a security advisory on the Kama Sutra/Blackworm/MyWife worm that's set to overwrite Office documents on infected PCs Friday, but the company has decided against updating its Windows Malicious Software Removal Tool before the next regularly-scheduled release of Feb. 14.

...It also notes that infected PCs will be in danger on Friday, Feb. 3, when the worm will overwrite several popular file formats, including those of Microsoft Office, with useless data...

full article: http://www.informationweek.com/news/show...=177105799

[rose]

...It also notes that infected PCs will be in danger on Friday, Feb. 3, when the worm will overwrite several popular file formats, including those of Microsoft Office, with useless data...

the company has decided against updating its Windows Malicious Software Removal Tool before the next regularly-scheduled release of Feb. 14.

The update will be useless on the 14th if files are destroyed on the 3rd  :

[mandy]

The Kama Sutra worm's anticipated bombshell ended up fizzling out, but experts are still divided on whether the brouhaha over the threat was justified.

The alarm around the worm may have helped avert a disaster for some PC users, since they were able to take action and clean up their computers, some experts say. But others fear that the predicted doomsday scenarios followed by a nonevent may cause PC users to become complacent about security alerts.

full article: http://news.zdnet.com/2100-1009_22-6035068.html