Sober Virus to return on 5 January to mark Nazi anniversary

Jon · Web Design Admin Joined: Jul 12, 2004 Posts: 73

Sober Virus to return on 5 January to mark Nazi anniversary

Did you recently receive one of those e-mails claiming to come from the FBI or the CIA, telling you they had information on your "illegal activities" on the internet?
If so, you were the recipient of an email from a machine infected with the Sober virus, and if you opened the email in any format other than plain text, or if you allowed it to show in a preview pane, chances are your machine is now infected and will send on spam on the next date the virus is programmed to activate.

VeriSign iDefense Security Intelligence Services has reverse-engineered the virus, and determined it will activate again on January 5 to coincide with the 87th anniversary of the founding of the German Nazi Party. This is a new form of a virus, and the term is "hactivism," combining malicious code with political content.

The analysts expect tens of millions of machines to send Nazi spam on January 5.

What can you do?

1) Make sure your antivirus definitions are up to date, and scan your computer with a reputable product.
2) If the virus is found, remove it of course.
3) If you received that email and opened it in anything other than plain text, assume your machine was infected. [If you open emails and see pictures or cute little signatures, you're viewing e-mails as HTML, and that is a very serious risk. Hacks like this can be embedded in HTML or code attached to the graphics. Also, merely viewing these HTML messages in a preview pane can trigger the virus being installed.] Follow steps 1 and 2.
4) Watch your inbox on January 5 and for a few days afterwards, and be prepared to delete some messages unread. Even if your machine is not infected, the hacker likely retrieved your email address from the address book on an infected machine.
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