Antivirus 09

Antivirus 09 is another fake antivirus that wants to con you out of your money.

Could the scammers have chosen any more of a dull name than Antivirus 09?

Antivirus 09 will run a security scan on your computer and tell you about all the nasty infections you have on there. Antivirus 09 doesn’t really scan your hard drive, you are just looking at an animation. This means that all those infections Antivirus 09 “found” are completely bogus just like it’s name.

Antivirus 09 is known to generate the following popup:

Malware or Advertising item was detected by Antivirus’09!
Detected Virus:Downloader.Small-772
Malicious object can corrupt your computer files and documents, and steel you personal data such as credit card info or email accounts!
Register to protect from next attack!
VIRUS ATTACK DETECTED!

There aren’t any manual removal instructions yet for Antivirus 09, probably because the anitvirus companies fell asleep as soon as they read it’s name.

For now, Click Start > Run: Type MSCONFIG, Click OK, Uncheck “Load Startup Items“, click OK and restart your computer when prompted. This should stop those annoying popups. Now click Start, Search, All File and Folders, and see if there is a folder called Antivirus 09. If it is there, delete it.

Popularity: 2% [?]

Excel Trojan targets unpatched flaws

Another day, another zero-day threat

Virus authors have reportedly created a Trojan that exploits an unpatched vulnerability in a range of versions of Excel.

Virus authors have reportedly created a Trojan that exploits an unpatched vulnerability in a range of versions of Excel.

The malware comes in the form of a maliciously constructed spreadsheet file with a malicious payload identified by McAfee, for example, as the BackDoor-DUE trojan. Many versions of Excel are vulnerable, including 2000, 2002, 2003, 2007, 2004/2008 for Mac, Excel Viewer/Excel Viewer 2003.

Keep reading “Excel Trojan targets unpatched flaws” »

Popularity: 2% [?]

WHAT ARE THE SECURITY THREATS?

Sophisticated Malware or just People?

“Security”, as the first article in this series points out, can always be found near the top of the list of concerns of every IT manager and IT director. Unfortunately the same subject can also manage to not quite make it onto the more important list of things to do something about now.

Over the years, a diverse array of solutions has come to market, each of which claims to enhance different aspects of an organisation’s IT security. Many can, indeed, enhance the capabilities in one or more areas. But security technology is only effective when deployed appropriately and, more importantly, when used correctly – by everyone in the business. And of course, security is not a one-shot operation – it cannot be assumed that the measures put in place a couple of years ago will still be appropriate today.

Keep reading “What are the security threats?” »

Popularity: 2% [?]

TWITTER ATTACK EXPOSES AWESOME POWER OF CLICKJACKING

Hard to stop, harder to resist

A worm that forced a wave of people to unintentionally broadcast messages on microblogging site Twitter shows the potential of a vulnerability known as clickjacking to dupe large numbers of internet users into installing malware or visiting malicious pages without any clue they’re being attacked.

The outbreak was touched off by tweets that led Twitter readers to a button labeled “Don’t click.” Gullible users (including your reporter) who clicked on the button automatically posted messages that posted yet more tweets advertising the link. The attacks persisted even after Twitter added countermeasures to its site and proclaimed the issued fixed.

Keep reading “Twitter attack exposes awesome power of clickjacking” »

Popularity: 1% [?]

SCAREWARE SCAMMERS RICKROLL DIGG

Bot comment blitz intensifies

Digg.com has become the latest Web 2.0 service to be abused by hackers in order to punt malware.

More than 500,000 bogus comments have reportedly been posted on the site in order to drive traffic to 15 malware-hosting domains that promote a rogue anti-virus (scareware) package. Panda Security compares the attacks, mounted by miscreants through bogus or compromised legitimate accounts, to Rickrolling.

Keep reading “Scareware scammers Rickroll Digg” »

Popularity: 2% [?]

SmitFraudFix Tools

You may notice that at the bottom of the page we promote a free tool called SmitFraudFix. A fake antivirus program has decided to exploit that name by calling itself SmitFraudFix Tools.

Fortunately it is very easy to tell the two apart. First of all SmitFraudFix Tools has a nice clean user interface. The real SmitFraudFix is very basic and doesn’t look modern.

Then there are the big give away’s like SmitFraudFix Tools constant bombardment of fake security alerts to trick you into buying the full version. Did I mention that the real SmitFraudFix is free.

The manual removal instructions for SmitFraudFix Tools are minimal at the moment so I recommend having Spyware Doctor remove SmitFraudFix Tools for you.

Popularity: 2% [?]

NEW WINDOWS VIRUS ATTACKS PHP, HTML, AND ASP SCRIPTS

Virut gets around

Researchers have identified a new strain of malware that can spread rapidly from machine to machine using a variety of infection techniques, including the poisoning of webservers, which then go on to contaminate visitors.

The malware is a variation of a rapidly mutating virus alternately known as Virut and Virux. It has long proved adept at injecting itself into executable files, which are then able to attack uninfected machines through network drives and USB sticks.

Keep reading “New Windows virus attacks PHP, HTML, and ASP scripts” »

Popularity: 1% [?]

OPENDNS ROLLS OUT CONFICKER TRACKING, BLOCKING

Downadup on notice

With an estimated 10 million PCs infected by the stealthy worm known as Conficker, it’s a good bet that plenty of administrators are blissfully unaware that their networks are playing host to the pest. Now, a free service called OpenDNS is offering a new feature designed to alert administrators to the damage and help them contain it.

The company on Monday plans to introduce an addition to its offerings that makes it easy for admins to know if even a single machine has been infected by Conficker. The service will also automatically protect infected machines by preventing them from connecting to rogue servers controlled by the malware authors.

Keep reading “OpenDNS rolls out Conficker tracking, blocking” »

Popularity: 2% [?]

PINCH TROJAN LIVES ON AFTER AUTHORS’ ARRESTS

S’kiddies squeeze suckers

Variants of the Pinch Trojan are infecting users more than a year after the arrest of its original authors.

More than 4,000 PCs a day were getting infected by just one variant of the information-pilfering malware, according to net security firm PrevX, which bases this estimate on logs from a malware control website left open by cybercriminals.

Keep reading “Pinch Trojan lives on after authors’ arrests” »

Popularity: 1% [?]

UNPATCHED WEB VULNS TURN INTERNET INTO DRIVE-BY WARZONE

Can’t patch, won’t patch

The compromise of corporate websites with malicious code and browser exploits became the preferred method for distributing malware last year, according to the annual security report from IBM’s ISS security tools division.

Cybercriminals are turning businesses against their own customers in the ongoing effort to steal data, the X-Force report warns. The prevalence of these drive-by download attacks is fuelled by application vulnerabilities and, worse still, flaws in custom applications.

Keep reading “Unpatched web vulns turn internet into drive-by warzone” »

Popularity: 1% [?]

Next Page »