A mass e-mail posing as a plea for aid to help the victims of last month's Asian tsunami disaster is actually a vehicle for spreading a computer virus, Web security firm Sophos said Monday.
The worm appears with the subject line: "Tsunami donation! Please help!" and invites recipients to open an attachment called "tsunami.exe" -- which, if opened, will forward the virus to other Internet users.
It could also initiate a denial-of-service attack against a German hacking Web Site, Sophos said, in which the site's server would be bombarded with messages, putting it out of action.
"Duping innocent users into believing that they may be helping the tsunami disaster aid efforts shows hackers stooping to a new low," Sophos senior technology consultant Graham Cluley said in a statement.
Sophos added that it had so far only received a small number of reports of the worm, which it said was not the first to try to take advantage of the Indian Ocean catastrophe in order to spread.
Another worm earlier this month propagated the message that the tsunami was God's revenge on "people who did bad on earth."
And there have been a number of mass emails sent out in an attempt to steal money, many of them versions of the so-called Nigerian Letter scam, to which readers are invited to reply with their details, apparently in order to help transfer large sums of money and receive a cut themselves.
One appears to be from a wealthy Thai merchant suffering from a fatal disease who has lost his family in the tsunami disaster and needs someone to collect millions of U.S. dollars from a European security firm to distribute it to charities.
"I need a God-fearing and trustworthy person that will be able to travel to Europe, to collect this deposit from the security company," the mail reads.
Sophos recommends recipients delete the mails and do not open the attachments.
Joined: Sun Oct 17, 2004 12:59 am Posts: 18643 Location: Raleigh, NC Gender: Male
Anyone who opens an .exe file that they get in an email deserves whatever happens to their PC.
I'm sorry, but some people should not own computers. It's no different than owning a car and not knowing that you have to change the oil or add coolant. If you don't know how to maintain something and don't have the sense to learn, don't buy it.
Joined: Fri Oct 29, 2004 5:45 pm Posts: 1481 Location: Jersey
Athletic Supporter wrote:
Anyone who opens an .exe file that they get in an email deserves whatever happens to their PC. I'm sorry, but some people should not own computers. It's no different than owning a car and not knowing that you have to change the oil or add coolant. If you don't know how to maintain something and don't have the sense to learn, don't buy it.
there are lots of dummies who never read one of the 'computer for Dummies' books and open everything (like my brother ).
Joined: Sun Oct 17, 2004 6:44 am Posts: 14671 Location: Baton Rouge Gender: Male
Athletic Supporter wrote:
Anyone who opens an .exe file that they get in an email deserves whatever happens to their PC. I'm sorry, but some people should not own computers. It's no different than owning a car and not knowing that you have to change the oil or add coolant. If you don't know how to maintain something and don't have the sense to learn, don't buy it.
Anyone who opens an .exe file that they get in an email deserves whatever happens to their PC. I'm sorry, but some people should not own computers. It's no different than owning a car and not knowing that you have to change the oil or add coolant. If you don't know how to maintain something and don't have the sense to learn, don't buy it.
I don't agree with that. Anyone can make a mistake. There are always going to be beginner computer users and people willing to exploit them. For example, my mother is a very intelligent woman who knows nothing about computers, and makes a lot of the same mistakes, but I help her when she's lost. I don't call her stupid and tell her to throw the computer away. At least she is trying to learn something new.
Joined: Sun Oct 17, 2004 12:59 am Posts: 18643 Location: Raleigh, NC Gender: Male
Angela wrote:
Athletic Supporter wrote:
Anyone who opens an .exe file that they get in an email deserves whatever happens to their PC. I'm sorry, but some people should not own computers. It's no different than owning a car and not knowing that you have to change the oil or add coolant. If you don't know how to maintain something and don't have the sense to learn, don't buy it.
I don't agree with that. Anyone can make a mistake. There are always going to be beginner computer users and people willing to exploit them. For example, my mother is a very intelligent woman who knows nothing about computers, and makes a lot of the same mistakes, but I help her when she's lost. I don't call her stupid and tell her to throw the computer away. At least she is trying to learn something new.
My aunt is the same.
However, it would be wise to learn what things are before clicking on them all willy-nilly, would it not? Particularly when the idea of computer viruses is so common and wellknown? If it's cold out, put on a hat, yanno?
My aunt is the same. However, it would be wise to learn what things are before clicking on them all willy-nilly, would it not? Particularly when the idea of computer viruses is so common and wellknown? If it's cold out, put on a hat, yanno?
Well of course it would be wise. But sometimes these things are not clicked willy-nilly. Sometimes dangerous emails appear to be from a friendly source and they contain really great instructions for how to completely ruin your computer and users like my mom who try their best to follow instructions think they are doing everything right. And of course there are lots of viruses where you don't have to click anything and it messes up your computer.
So.. uh.. anyhoo, about this thread - damn these people who exploit tragedies.
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