Gizmodo Australia » trojan

Naked Erin Andrews Video May Be Trojan Horse For Mac And PC

Jesus Diaz — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 03:00:00 +0000

If you are hunting down Erin Andrews’ naked peephole video and you are a dummy, beware: It may be a trick to get you to install a trojan horse, disguised as a video player.

The bad guys have released a file that requires you to install a custom video player, which is in fact a Mal/EncPk-IF malware—for PCs—or a OSX/Jahlav-C trojan horse—for Macs. Then again, if you believe that any video file requires a custom video player, you probably should get this and many other viruses. And some nasty bacteria too.

In case you are not a sports follower—like me—or don’t know who the hell Erin Andrews is—like me—or don’t find her sexy at all—like me—here’s a CBS program talking about it:

[PPC World]

Symantec Finds First Mac Botnet, Already Launching DDoS Attacks

Jason Chen — Sat, 18 Apr 2009 00:57:06 +0000

The first Mac botnet is already launching DDoS attacks against some website, which penetrated Macs via tainted copies of iWork ‘09 and Photoshop CS4. Just like what we told you about in January. Be careful when you pirate stuff. [ZDNet via NYT]

US Military Wasted Millions on Fake Hardware, Sparking Cyber-Terrorism Fears

Gizmodo US Edition — Sat, 10 May 2008 19:00:00 +0000

The U.S. Military has spent millions of dollars on counterfeit computer components over the years, according to an FBI report. This not only screws over businesses, but it also makes it easier for cyber-terrorists to hack into our systems by putting trojans and viruses in fake circuitry. An anti-counterfeit initiative by the FBI, led to 15 criminal cases and over US$3.5 million worth of seized products.

The FBI op, named Cisco Raider, was a two-year-old operation that targeted illegal distributors of fake network hardware, mostly manufactured in China. With the help of their Chinese counterparts and Cisco Systems, the FBI has so far executed 39 search warrants and confiscated roughly 3,500 network components.

The FBI is still not sure whether the counterfeit goods were distributed for profit or for reasons more insidious. Though Cisco says none of the counterfeited goods contained spyware, the threat of hackers infiltrating our systems is very real.

Modern circuits have billions of parts, so it’s incredibly hard to detect the tweaked bits that could help nefarious foes take over our military infrastructure. And once the cyber-terrorists take over, who’re we going to call? John McClane? [New York Times]

Happy 30th Birthday, Spam!

Gizmodo US Edition — Sun, 04 May 2008 01:30:00 +0000

Oh Spam, my how you have grown! Thirty years ago, on this day, you came into the world as a little misguided e-mail sent by an equipment engineer over Arpanet to promote a new line of computers. You were quickly shot down by other Arpanet users who called it an “insult… to have an obvious commercial message sent out over a research network.” Yet, at some point in time, people stopped protesting you loudly enough. Now you comprise 80 percent to 95 percent of all e-mail sent, your crafty trojans and pesky viruses have infected millions of computers, and you’ve cost IT departments nearly US$200 billion to combat you. But since it’s your birthday, instead of telling you like we usually do to GTFO, let us sing you a little song instead. It goes something like this:

Spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, SPAM! LOVELY SPAM!

April 24, 1184 B.C.: First Trojan Horse Attack

Brian Lam — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 07:36:46 +0000

From Wired’s Randy Alfred:

1184 B.C.: During the Trojan War, the Greeks depart in ships, leaving behind a large wooden horse as a victory offering. It is hauled inside the walls of Troy, and Greek soldiers descend from the horse’s belly after dark to slay the guards and commence destruction of the city.

[Wired]

Phishing Scams and Viruses Can Be Beautiful, Deadly

Nick Broughall — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 05:29:22 +0000

Spam is horrible. Phishing is evil. Computer Viruses are potentially deadly (to your computer). They’re also exsquisitely breathtaking, if you look at the work of Alex Dragulescu.

Security Firm MessageLabs commissioned the digital artist to create 15 interpretations of different viruses, trojans, spam, worms and spyware code. What you’re looking at above is the MyDoom email worm.

The images were created by inserting part of the actual code from the various online threat into a proprietary algorithm which twisted it, turned it, shook it around and turned it into art. We’ve got more pics, plus the artist’s own explanation below.

Malwarez is a series of
visualization of worms, viruses, trojans and spyware code. For each
piece of disassembled code, API calls, memory addresses and subroutines
are tracked and analyzed. Their frequency, density and grouping are
mapped to the inputs of an algorithm that grows a virtual 3D entity.
Therefore the patterns and rhythms found in the data drive the
configuration of the artificial organism.

Text and Spam image – SUBJECT: HAVE YOU EVER HEARD THAT YOU ARE GETTING FAT?

Phishing – SUBJECT: CONFIRM YOUR ONLINE ACCOUNT DETAILS

Email worm – NETSKY

I think the most amazing thing about these is that you actually get a feeling for the hidden malevolence in each of them. Hit the link for the artist’s website with even more images. And thanks to Seamus at TimeOut Sydney (Yes, the same Seamus that used be editor here at Giz AU) for the tip.

[Alex Dragulescu]

Seagate Accidentally Shipped 1,800 Trojan-Horse Tainted Drives

Wilson Rothman — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 16:06:37 +0000

Roughly 1,800 external drives manufactured by Seagate were infected with a Trojan horse virus that sent personal information back to China, according to the Taipei Times. The disk drives, sold at retail in Taiwan, were presumably messed with when they were in the possession of one of Seagate’s Chinese subcontractors. The situation has been locked down, but it certainly puts a new spin on security fears, and Seagate itself has got to be pretty freaked out. All we have at the moment is a statement: “All products leaving the factory are now cleared of the virus.” [Reuters]

Series 60 Phones Get Their First Trojan

Jason Chen — Tue, 22 May 2007 00:40:12 +0000

If you’re using a S60 phone from Nokia, watch out. Kaspersky Labs has just discovered the first trojan, Troja-SMS.Symb.OS.Viver, that will affect the S60 OS. If you mistakenly download this from the internet and install this on your phone – which is easy to do, since it’s mislabelled and disguised as a useful photo editor or video codec packâ€”the virus will start sending out SMS messages like nobody’s business.

Why should you care? Because these SMSes are sent to premium ringtone downloads and other services, which will cost you between $1 and $10 per message. Ouch.

If you really want to keep your phone safe from Trojans, check out the video above from our time at CeBIT. â€“ Jason Chen

First Trojan-SMS virus for S60 Smartphones [Unwired View]