George(s) Lessard on Wed, 5 Dec 2001 08:02:02 +0100 (CET)


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[Nettime-bold] 'Goner' worm plagues computers


'Goner' worm plagues computers
A new computer worm named "Goner" is spreading through corporate and
personal e-mail inboxes, deleting system files and clogging networks in
what could be the biggest outbreak since last year's "Love Letter" virus,
security software vendors said.
[ Full story at...(requires free registration)... .ed ]  
http://breakingnews.scmp.com/NLet/NLet.asp?Sec=technology&Id=ZZZD9UV
CQUC

[Excerpt]

"Goner is one of the most incredibly fast moving and potentially dangerous e-
mail viruses we've seen," said Mark Sunner, chief technology officer of 
MessageLabs.

Network Associates had seen several hundred thousand infections, said 
Michael Callahan, director of marketing for the company's McAfee division.
"We're seeing a slight bump as Asia comes online," he said late in the day.
The worm, a virus that propagates itself to other computers through the 
Internet or other networks, is affecting users of Microsoft's Outlook and 
Outlook Express, said Ian 
Hameroff, business manager of security solutions at Computer Associates 
International.
People using ICQ instant messenger and Internet Relay Chat also are 
susceptible to the worm because files can be transferred across those 
networks, Mr Hameroff said.
Outlook 2002 users were not as impacted since it blocked potentially harmful 
attachments by default and warned users when a program tries to access e-
mail addresses, 
according to Internet Security Systems.
The Goner worm arrives in an attachment masquerading as a screen saver, 
with an e-mail subject line of "Hi" and text that says: "How are you? When I 
saw this screen saver, 
I immediately thought about you I am in a harry [sic], I promise you will love 
it!"

Goner would also try to install a back door on machines that could turn them 
into launch pads for denial of service attacks, said Symantec.
In denial of service attacks malicious hackers remotely control multiple PCs, 
sometimes thousands of them, ordering them to flood Web servers with so 
much traffic that 
Web sites are effectively shut down to legitimate traffic.
"This is at outbreak status, which is very rare," said April Goostree, virus 
research manager at McAfee.com. "The last outbreak we had was 'Love 
Letter' in May 2000."
A virus wass given outbreak status by McAfee.com if it was determined to be 
spreading quickly and affecting large corporate networks as well as individual 
computer users, 
Ms Goostree said.
One of the nastier aspects of the virus was its attempt to disable anti-virus 
and firewall software, so that victims had to reinstall the software in order to 
prevent future 
infections, said Sunner of MessageLabs.


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