New virus targets 64-bit version of Windows
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The virus, dubbed W64.Shruggle by Symantec, seems mainly to be an experiment to test the concept of a 64-bit infecter and is not actively spread, said Alfred Huger, senior director of security at Symantec.
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A new computer worm emerged on Tuesday which broke the speed record from the announcement of a security vulnerability in Microsoft&#39;s Internet Explorer to a full-blown virus that spreads in the wild.
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Over the past month, a new type of malicious software has emerged, using a decades-old technique to hide itself from antivirus software.The malware, called Trojan.Mebroot by Symantec, installs itself on the first part of the computer&#39;s hard drive to be read on startup, then makes changes to the Windows kernel, making it hard for security software to detect it.Criminals have been installing Trojan.Mebroot, known as a master boot record rootkit, since mid-December, and were able to infect nearly 5,000 users in two separate attacks, staged on Dec. 12 and Dec. 19, according to Verisign&#39;s iDefense Intelligence Team. In order to install the software on a victim&#39;s computer, attackers first lure them to a compromised Web site, which then launches a variety of attacks against the victim&#39;s computer in hopes of finding a way to run the rootkit code on the PC.Once installed, the malware gives attackers control over the victim&#39;s machine.The group behind this latest rootkit is the same one responsible for the Torpig Trojan, and it is believed to have already installed more than 250,000 Trojan programs, iDefense said in a report on the rootkit published Monday.The interesting thing about Trojan.Mebroot is that it installs itself on the master boot record (MBR). This is the first sector of the computer&#39;s hard drive and it is the place the computer goes to first whenever it wants to boot up the operating system. &quot;Basically, if you can control the MBR, you can control the operating system and therefore the computer it resides on,&quot; wrote Symantec researcher Elia Florio in a blog posting on Trojan.Mebroot.The criminals are using several different versions of this attack code, some of which are not currently being detected by some antivirus products, iDefense said.&quot;At the moment the AV detection is hit and miss across the board, however in the last day a number of vendors have added detection for it already,&quot; said Andrew Storms, director of security operations with nCircle Network Security. &quot;As for penetration, so far many people are showing it as having a low overall distribution. The concern is that the group which may be preparing to distribute the rootkit is well-prepared.&quot;Malicious software that infected the master boot record was common during the MS-DOS era, but it has not been used much in attacks in recent years.In 2005, however, researchers at eEye Digital Security gave a talk at the Black Hat security conference, showing how a rootkit could hide itself on the MBR. This Trojan.Mebroot software is derived from that code, iDefense said.Getting this kind of malicious software to work reliably is a technical challenge, and there have generally been easier ways for the bad guys to take over PCs in recent years, said Marc Maiffret, an independent security researcher who was chief technology officer at eEye when the code was first developed.Attackers were given a hand last year, however, when researchers at NV Labs published a proof of concept MBR rootkit.Maiffret said that while we may soon see more of these MBR rootkits, &quot;it won&#39;t take long for all the antivirus companies to react.&quot;&quot;It&#39;s not some new attack vector that&#39;s going to be hard to prevent,&quot; he said. &quot;It&#39;s just something that people haven&#39;t really paid attention to.&quot;
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Digital pest prototype infects files only found in early Windows code for AMD 64-bit Opteron processors.
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Clicking the fraudulent update could install malicious code on your desktop.
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Over the past month, a new type of malicious software has emerged, using a decades-old technique to hide itself from antivirus software.
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Microsoft Corp.  warned about a  new computer virus that exploits a vulnerability in its  PowerPoint presentation software to allow hackers to infiltrate  computer systems.
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New variant offers holiday greetings before infecting your PC with a virus.
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A Chinese security group has released sample code to exploit two new unpatched flaws in Microsoft Windows. The advisory comes in the week before Christmas, a time when many companies and home users are least prepared to deal with the problems.
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Making use of the current trend to send festive greetings via email, a new virus is making the rounds. A variant of the ZAFI worm, the WORM_Zafi.
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A new version of the Santy worm appeared over the weekend and poses a broader threat than its ancestors. A new version of the Santy worm appeared over the weekend, and according to analysis done by some security
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The number of new viruses and worms aimed at Microsoft Corp.'s  ubiquitous Windows operating system rose 400 percent between January and June from the same year-earlier period, leading computer security company Symantec said on Sunday.
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Security experts say these traits are common among the thousands of viruses targeting Microsoftâs ubiquitous Windows operating system but are virtually unheard of amongst the Apple Macintosh community.
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A hacker has released attack code that could be used to exploit a critical bug in some versions of the Windows operating system.
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Workshop Windows virus cleanup primer
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Computers running Microsoft Windows XP can be infected by a new Trojan horse, program remotely controlled in a victim&#39;s system, even after it is patched with Microsoft&#39;s
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With viruses, worms, spyware, spam and phishing, running a computer this year -- especially one with Windows -- has often been a colossal headache. -Rob Pegoraro