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Santa's Bringing Malware for Christmas
By June Campbell of Nightcats Multimedia Productions
You better watch out, you better not cry. Santa's bringing malware and I'm telling you why .... So You Think You're Safe from a Malware Infection? So did I. I was running an automatically updated anti-malware program supplied by Telus, my ISP. It scanned for viruses, worms, trojans, spyware and hostile codes of all sorts. I had a hardware firewall in place. My ISP scanned my email at server level, ensuring no malicious code reached my inbox. My OS and other software was updated with the most recent security patches. On top of this, I exercised reasonable caution in my personal computing activities. I had survived online for 13 years without a single virus. Then I experienced an infection so severe that it almost cost me my system and my data. The Malware Invasion For quite some time, my computer had been slow and cumbersome. Web surfing was equally slow. I attributed it to having too many plugins and too much software. Then one day I hit the Search button on my Google toolbar and suddenly a dozen or so windows popped up running advertisements. I could not close them. The computer froze. I rebooted and as soon as the OS loaded, multiple messages popped up apparently from Microsoft Security Center telling me I had viruses. Noting that one of these windows had a misspelling, I was suspicious and did not touch it. Instead, I tried running Telus E-Protect software. It didn't run. I opened Firefox and immediately the dozen windows popped up again containing ads. I managed to download Spyware Doctor, (an excellent program, under most circumstances). Spyware Doctor removed about 16 malicious codes, including Virtummmonde, V.B.Zu, Trojan FakeAlert and Windows Anti-V However, within minutes, the popups and other symptoms were back. To make a long story short, I engaged the services of Telus Professional Services, a team of technicians who remove malware on a per-incident basis. They work on your computer remotely and communicate with you via telephone or online chat. Cleaning up the Mess
Two days and three exhausted technicians later, the computer was apparently free from the malicious codes. Apparently, the infection involved a highly dangerous root kit -- a difficult to find piece of code that includes keystroke loggers and allows remote access to unauthorized users. It hides, and releases miscellaneous trojan horses, worms and viruses on a rotating basis. Therefore, although scanners can remove the viruses it unleashes, the source code remains hidden and ready to reinfect momentarily. The code infected every software program that was launched during this period -- including the specialized scanners that the technicians installed. The technician reported that the source file uses a different name in every computer, making it extremely difficult to track and remove. They also said there was about a 30% chance they could remove the code without irreparable damage to my OS. Luckily, I fell in the 30% and they managed to clean the system safely. They also said that in most cases, backup tapes or backup devises would be affected as well. Professionals can apparently do a "clean install" which could save your documents and files, but trying to do the re-install yourself would be risky.
Safe Computing Practices I have no idea how I became infected with this code, but it seems likely that it must have been from a web site. Perhaps I downloaded a file or program believing it was safe. As the technicians explained, many of these codes are time activated, so I could have downloaded the file weeks or months ago and it sat dormant waiting for the date to arrive when it was scheduled to deploy. The technicians recommend that in the future, before giving any web site permission to download and install a script or tile, that I run a Google search for the file name and see what others have said about it. It's good advice. I plan to follow it. For your own protection, I suggest you do the same. This is one nasty bug and you want to avoid it.
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Contributor's Note
June Campbell provides business writing services. She offers guides for writing business plans and business proposals, sample joint venture agreements, non-disclosure agreements, employment contracts and more.
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Wikipedia List of Rogue Software
| MS Antivirus 2009 Explained at Wikipedia
| Windows Defender at Wikipedia
PLEASE VISIT THE CONTRIBUTOR'S WEBSITE
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