The sobigF virus.......it.....it.....STOPPED! (1 Viewer)

[Ronald Epstein]

Well, the reports said it would happen, and it has!

On September 10th, the sobigF virus was
to cease.

It happened just as promised.

For the first time in over a month, I don't have
to go in my personal email box and delete 500
virus-laden emails caused by the most (for lack of
better word) annoying virus ever to be unleashed.

At least the programmer of sobigF had a
heart to put an expiration date on this thing.

For the first time, my mailbox is quiet.

Of course, experts claim that this particular virus
was just testing waters for something even BIGGER.
I suppose the worst has yet to come.

 

[brentl]

It's strange for you to make this kind of post Ron ... you're usually all business nowadays .... good to see you happy

or is that just relieved?

"testing waters for something even BIGGER." I heard that too. Kind of scary eh!!

 

[Rob Gillespie]

Expect SoBig-G any day.

 

[Rob Gillespie]

I don't have to go in my personal email box and delete 500 virus-laden emails

You shouldn't really have to do that anyway Ron. The main AV products should filter infected mails for you.

 

[JamesHl]

The reason that they expire is so that the various different versions don't have to compete with each other in the wild. The eventual goal of these viruses is unclear, but this version used computers that had been cracked by the last version (admittedly unsuccesfully) for some nefarious purpose. It's theorized that some group of spammers or people who work for them are behind it, as previous versions have also used infected computers as spam relays.

Time will tell. Enjoy the respite while it lasts, Ron.

 

[Ronald Epstein]

You shouldn't really have to do that anyway Ron. The main AV products should filter infected mails for you

Actually, while Norton Antivirus does filter
out the virus, when you have 500 virus emails,
the filter takes forever to do its job. Norton
stops at every email to tell you it has a virus.

I use MailWasher to delete the mail before
it gets downloaded. It involves having to manually
remove each message, however.

 

[Ron Alcasid]

Microsoft just released patch for another RPC vulnerability.

http://www.microsoft.com/security/se...s/MS03-039.asp

 

[Kevin P]

You can configure Norton AntiVirus to clean emails automatically without notifying you.

All the Sobig variants (except for the first, Sobig.A) had expiration dates. Shortly after the expiration of one variant, a new one appeared. So don't be surprised if Sobig.G appears in the next few weeks. :rolleyes

Many security experts think that the Sobig author is using the virus to create an army of infected zombie PCs that can be used for relaying spam, etc. Each variant, designed to stop spreading after a few weeks, "enlists" more PCs into the zombie army, by installing backdoors or "automatic" downloading of trojans.

So this battle is over, but the war rages on...

 

[Brian Ruth]

Quoth the Kevin"

So this battle is over, but the war rages on...

The movie buff in me is just now imagining a yellow oblique scroll over a field of stars....

SPAM WARS!

A long, long time ago, in an internet far far away....

 

[Rob Gillespie]

Microsoft just released patch for another RPC vulnerability.

Any company that got caught out because it doesn't have a proper patch deployment strategy and infrastructure, is about to get caught out all over again.

 

[Chas_T]

Ron,

Thanks for the heads up on yet, another Microsoft patch.