By Stevie Smith Sep 12, 2007, 13:46 GMT
Fans of peer-to-peer Internet telephone system Skype have this been seen the unwanted appearance of a new computer worm attack that rears its ugly head in the form of a seemingly innocuous instant-messaging chat invitation.
"Hey, where I put ur photo ;-) now u populr. oops sorry please dont look there. look what crazy photo Tiffany sent me, looks cool."
Skype users on the lookout for the worm in question are being advised to avoid the above instant message (and variations of it), which promises to provide the user with potentially adult imagery should they opt to follow the link included within the invite message.
Anyone foolish enough to click the link in the hope of attaining provocative material is then faced with a standard issue ‘Run or Save’ acceptance window, which, if used, presents the malicious worm with access to the host PC system via Skype’s application programming interface (API).
Once in control of the user’s hardware, the worm then takes deactivates any onboard security software before then dispatching copies of itself out to anyone and everyone on the user’s Skype contact list. If that weren’t bad enough, the worm also burrows deeper into the host computer in order to pilfer personal information including passwords.
The Washington Post outlines that various anti-virus security vendors have labelled the worm in different guises, including the likes of "W32/Pyskpa.D (Symantec)" and "W32/Skipi.A (F-Secure)."
According to a related report published by NewsFactor.com, Internet security company F-Secure has outlined that the Skype worm specifically "creates startup keys for itself in the Windows Registry and even modifies the Windows host file to block access to antivirus vendor sites."
Skype spokesman Villu Arak has outlined that leading anti-virus vendors such as F-Secure, Kaspersky, and Symantec have already updated their respective security software to safely deal with the worm, which only affects computers operating on a Microsoft Windows OS. Skype users worried about possible infection should update their anti-virus software and run a hardware scan just to be on the safe side.
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DeadplantSep 12th, 2007 - 16:09:42
For the thousandth time: that's not a worm.
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