February 14, 2006
Veronique De Freitas
Internet users should watch out for a new version of the Bagle worm that poses as a message offering free tickets to the Winter Olympics in Turin.
According to anti-virus company Sophos, the Bagle.CM worm spreads via email with subject lines such as 'FREE OLYMPIC TICKETS LOTTERY!', '2006 Winter Games in Torino' and '2006 Torino Winter Games FREE Tickets' - with attached file names including 'Generated_bill.exe' and 'Service_receipt.exe'.
The malicious message claims to come from a company selling tickets for the games in Turin and offers tickets to Olympic final events.
Once you open the infected attachment the malicious code will automatically download onto your computer and allow remote access to hackers.
According to security experts, the Bagle-CM worm is also spreading via P2P file-sharing sites disguised as nude pictures of actress Kate Beckinsale, or adult videos of Paris Hilton and Britney Spears.
"This latest incarnation of the Bagle worm is hiding behind the flag of the Winter Olympics in an attempt to infect the unwary. But sensible precautions and a spoonful of common sense should ensure that no-one needs to have their computer struck down," said Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant for Sophos.
Separately, security experts are urging web users to take care of fake Valentine's e-cards, dodgy dating websites, and phishing scams used by fraudsters to steal money.
Pete Simpson, manager of the Threatlab research centre at Clearswift said: ?Emails purporting to offer a link to a Valentine's Day e-card will link to a site mimicking a real e-card site (Original Cards) and ask users to download card reader software. In reality, attempting to download the card reader may result in the download of a malicious ActiveX control.?
The attack works only with Internet Explorer, as Firefox, Opera and several other browsers refuse ActiveX controls.
Topic: Bagle worm hides behind Turin tickets (Read 831 times)