Targeted Trojans: A New Online Threat to Business
472854
(MessageLabs) Learn about the alarming trend of custom viruses targeted at high-ranking business officials such as CIOs, CEOs and more. Carried in convincingly written emails with innocuous looking office attachments such as word files or spreadsheets, these viruses steal important business information and send it to criminals around the world. Also, in the succinct white paper, learn the distinct advantages of the MessageLabs Email and Web Security solutions in thwarting these threats. Our advanced technology performs additional levels of attachment analysis, but, unlike other security offerings, doesn't release any after-the-fact security updates, which criminals use to test their latest viruses against.
721179
Chennai, Dec.9: An alert for a data-stealing Trojan horse programme that installs itself on computers by offering to fight spam has been sounded on the Internet, the New Scientist news service reported today.
509672
Thar she blows Spam messages exploiting the publicity surrounding the release of the latest instalment of the Pirates of the Caribbean film franchise are being used to trick users into installing Trojan horse malware.â¦
244754
IT security vendors and analysts reported an increase in the number of cyberattacks being targeted at specific companies doing business online. An ongoing denial-of-service attack against payment processor Authorize.Net is a prime example.
270107
9 out of 10 messages are junk Trojan programs, particularly those designed to steal online gaming account credentials, have become the mainstay of malware authors.â¦
372247
A Trojan horse computer program that uses infected computers to churn out mobile phone spam messages is causing concern among antivirus firms.
176456
Users of Nokia&#39;s 7610 smart phone and other phones running Symbian&#39;s Series 60 software should be aware of a new Trojan program on the Internet.
93420
A new Trojan horse program that attacks and removes troublesome advertising software, known as "adware," is circulating on the Internet, according to antivirus company Symantec Corp.
79963
Web gateway filtering specialist Finjan is reporting a new toolkit that uses randomized JavaScript to stay hidden from virus crawlers and deliver its payload via compromised Web sites.Dubbed by Finjan's Malicious Code Research Center (MCRC) as the "Random JS Toolkit," the malware development package is allowing attackers to create threats that only attempt to victimize an individual computer in the same manner a single time to protect against discovery by anti-virus systems and researchers' automated "crawlers."By dynamically changing the JavaScript employed to deliver each variant of attack being created, and by using random file names that are only delivered to the same machine or IP address once, Finjan researchers said the malware authoring package is meant to avoid the programs used by AV researchers to find new threats emerging on the Web.Typically when automated crawler programs come across new attack samples, they return to the threats' source URLs to verify their names and characteristics and to create signature files that allow their products to block the programs -- or they enter the sites onto so-called blacklists of compromised domains.However, once a machine has been infected with an attack made using the Random JS Toolkit, the threat will recognize that the machine has already been targeted and won't attempt to download it again, thereby thwarting efforts to identify or track the exploits, Finjan experts contend.During the month of December 2007, Finjan estimates that more than 10,000 individual sites were compromised with attacks built using the Random JS Toolkit. Most of the URLs serving as distribution points for the attacks were legitimate sites that had been hijacked, the company said.Among the infected sites were some that would qualify as well-known, highly trusted domains, said Yuval Ben-Itzhak, chief technology officer of Finjan.Ben-Itzhak said the toolkit serves as a prime example of the types of tactics he expects leading-edge malware authors to utilize more frequently in the coming year."We've found the initial 10,000 sites, but we're sure that there are many more that have already been infected. When we can find this number of exploits, it is clear that this must be a very significant attack that has affected a lot of people," he said. "Using the combination of techniques available in this toolkit, the threats that are being created can become very powerful and stay alive to infect people for longer periods of time."Among the types of malware infections being served up using the toolkit, Finjan has observed everything from Trojan viruses and keystroke loggers to botnet recruiting programs, he said.For its part, Finjan's real-time code inspection technology can defend against such threats because it eschews the use of traditional virus signatures or blacklists in favor of constant monitoring for any malware activity coming across a network armed with one of its devices, Ben-Itzhak maintains.Rival AV vendors, including Symantec, contend that features such as the market leader's recently developed "generic exploit prevention," based on behavioral cues, should also be able to isolate and defend against such emerging attacks.Unlike the widespread iFrame attacks that proliferated across the Web during 2007, threats created using the Random JS Toolkit will also be much harder for security researchers to track down because they do not lead back to central sites where the actual malware code itself is hosted, Finjan maintains.Since the involved malware code is loaded directly on a site, and it won't attempt infect the same computer or IP address twice, traditional URL blacklisting and signature-based techniques will likely prove futile against the attack, the company said.However, from what the security appliance vendor can deduce, Ben-Itzhak said the firm believes there is only one malware group currently using the toolkit."From what we can tell, all the information flowing back from the compromised sites is heading to the same server," he said. "This indicates that there is probably only one group controlling this malware code thus far, and that they are probably being very successful; this is just another step forward for the criminals involved to continue to improve their attack methods and remain undetected."Ben-Itzhak said that the involved server is not one that matches any of the company's lists of machines controlled by well-known malware authoring groups such as the Russian Business Network. The server the company is tracking was originally located in Europe, but has recently been moved to China -- and likely will continue to be moved around to avoid detection, according to the expert.Most of the data the security company has seen being sent to the server has been related to online banking username and password data, he said.As part of its investigation, Finjan discovered that one of the Web properties infected with the randomized JavaScript attacks was an online advertising network that serves up as many as 14 million online banner ads per week. The security device maker reported that unnamed company was informed and is currently working to clean out its systems.
86147
Anti-virus experts at Sophos have advised that a new Internet worm is defacing web bulletin boards across the globe. The Santy worm exploits a vulnerability in a piece of software often used to provide discussion
526426
It may be a single malicious user with an axe to grind, and that user may be targeting a very small group of people who just happen to use Microsoft Excel. But whoever it is continues to make security firms like Symantec nervous, as yet another Excel-based document with a malformed image string, dubbed Trojan.Mdropper.Y, has turned up.
616780
Seen in wild for first time, malware cleans one victim out of $8,600 Miscreants have unleashed a new strain of a sophisticated Trojan that targets eBay users by feeding them spoofed web pages containing fraudulent information about high-ticket purchases, The Register has learned. It has already contributed to an $8,600 loss by one eBay member.â¦
46251
Feeding on fat cats A researcher has uncovered malware that targets commercial bank customers by logging into their online accounts and wiring large sums to accounts under the control of criminals.â¦
209318
At least it's not stealthy, one supposes: A newly reported Trojan not only tries to delete all the user's files, but plays a highly annoying audio clip as it does so.
477742
Security researchers studying the latest Internet crime trends have discovered a new Eastern European website that uses a large botnet to infect vulnerable PCs. The operators of the botnet and website charge clients for each successful PC infection.
87931
Latest worm poses a risk to many Web sites using the PHP scripting language.
66012
A new, more dangerous variant of the Santy.e virus appeared over the holiday weekend. The malware uses search engines to locate vulnerable Web sites, which it defaces.