[Joisushi]

Have you guys heard of it? Here is a short description of it

The worm, primarily known as Conflicker, spread widely over the holidays, when companies’ IT staffs were on break. It does pretty much all the nasty things that worms are known to do: sneak in, either via the Internet or via the old Sneakernet (USB drives and the like), change your password, start running services that download further code from some Web site, etc.
http://www.crunchgear.com/2009/01/19/dont-...conflicer-worm/

News Article about it

Conficker Worm Threatens Computers Worldwide

Posted: 3:51 pm EDT April 1, 2009Updated: 4:37 pm EDT April 1, 2009
People across the world have braced themselves for the Conficker Worm, which was set to infect millions of computers on April 1.

The conficker is a dangerous type of robot software, also known as "Botnets," that blocks the user from accessing Microsoft and security software sites.

Marcus Sachs of the Sans Internet Storm Center said the virus could allow others to gain access to a person's computer. These hackers can then send out spam e-mails or steal personal identification information.

Security experts believed the conficker worm would cause computers to "phone home" on April 1. They estimated anywhere from two to 12 million computers would be affected by the virus.

Experts have been working to notify and prepare the public before the conficker worm infects computers and networks.

Security experts say the best defense against the virus is an up-to-date anti-virus scanner.

"This actual worm, what it does is actually uses a very old security flaw in Windows to infect your computer. So all you really have to do is just to run a Windows update and update your system," said Roman Corrales, a member of the Geek Squad technical support group.

So far, no reports of the virus have been reported in the U.S. In the meantime, security experts are working to prevent similar computer worms that could appear unannounced.

There is a simple test to determine whether a computer has been infected. If a computer cannot connect to anti-virus Web sites like Symantec and McAfee, it may have the worm.

The virus has shown activity worldwide, especially in countries where pirated versions of Microsoft software are used without the protection of security upgrades.

Microsoft is offering a $250,000 reward for any information that may lead to the hackers.

http://www.wtov9.com/news/19067708/detail.html

Did any of you get it? I think I did...this morning, my dad told me that he got an email from me containing nothing but a link. I NEVER SENT THE EMAIL!!! And yes, the link was a virus. Does anyone know how to get rid of it?

Don't click on any link anyone sends you!!!

[DarkMagician]

I saw this on the news once, the day before April Fool's.
Install Microsoft Security Update MS08-067: http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/...n/MS08-067.mspx
And then Clean the infected systems, and reboot
Use anti-malware solutions such as AVG Anti Virus to clean the infection.

And remember keep an Anti Virus System Up to date, So it stops it before the virus spreads itself!

[nevets1219]

Here is also another way to detect if you have the virus. I believe Microsoft's Malicious Software Removal Tool also detects and removes Conficker though there are also other tools.

[NPB-XK]

Hah... I'm not really surprised... I saw that coming months ago.
$250,000... They haven't changed their rewards... Always 250,000 to find every hackers responsible of different destructive and popular worms. It's still tempting but it's way too hard to trace the authors of worms like that. Even if the authors put some messages in their codes/scripts, still, what to do?... Many grey hat professional hackers have tried, I have tried, everyone has tried. At some point, when we found nothing, we decide to give up. I don't even wanna start to trace those hackers again.
Gotta play a big psychological game with those hackers until they make mistakes to reveal some clues (everyone has a flaw) but many won't fall for it.

You may have been infected by another malware. It doesn't mean that a popular one just got out on news and "Oh I think this one infected my computer!". We need to double check.

Oh yeah by the way... For anyone...
Suggestion: Put an invalid email address in your contacts. Like this, you'll be sure if the virus is still WORKING/ACTIVE, without bothering your dad or friends or etc. To know if it's active, once you log in, a message will pop up saying that your email couldn't be sent to the following contact *****@***.com because it's invalid / it doesn't exist. Even if you look at your Outbox, it may not even be there. So that's how you can know it without bothering anyone by asking them all the time. Also, many people are quiet when they receive those stuff. So the trick is useful.

Plus, "Security experts say the best defense against the virus is an up-to-date anti-virus scanner.", yes but not always. I'm specialized in that field independently (grey hat) and I'm also a malware creator, I'm telling you that a lot of scanners can't find some infections once those malwares are already infecting your computer. But yes, a lot of "protections" can prevent those malwares to do anything to your computer. But once you're infected, it's another story, it's becoming way harder. As I used to say... "The best malware fighter is humans ourselves if we know what we're doing."... So in this case, if you are infected, we gotta be sure what the infection REALLY is, rather than pointing that out on conficker. Once we know it, we know how to be sure to take them out. There are billions and billions of malwares out there. A lot still go undetected on all anti-virus.
I'll accept to help you on PM if you send me a request there.

Always check for updates on anti-malwares.

Yesterday, people have been asking me if the spams from MSN had anything to do with it. I'll answer here again, NO it has nothing to do with conficker. There's no relation at all and it should be obvious. Yes, the Windows Live team said that they made a mistake but I assume that they covered it up since they don't wanna lose their faithful MSN fans from the fact that there's been an internal hack going on. Or probably a guy who got kicked out of his job from those MSN/Hotmail companies and he got pissed so he decided to mess around, spamming those. Other hackers claimed it was an external hack creating scams. Rookies. The link given wasn't a scam, it was straight from Microsoft server and I didn't take a look but I believe in what Microsoft security said on that, the page was safe and not modified internally to turn into a scam. Even if it was, the security recovered it quickly. Not a chance for external hack.

For security in the world, I warn them, all companies, especially big companies, they MUST update their OS!
It can be chaos to the world: hospitals, electricity companies, researchers, militaries, etc, etc... They rely on computers a lot and imagine what it could happen once a powerful worm travels around them and crush them down. City, states, even possible country black out. Hopefully we can recover lost data. But sad to the companies who can't. Actually, aiming on computers will be part of about 80% of the strategy in the next World War.

A lot of powerful worms are created and tested in labs. My organization has fun working on it. But knowing how destructive they are, we don't release them out to public. We just know what we're up to. Some other organizations accidentally slipped some worms out to the public and they had to put a message of "Sorry for the damage" hidden in the script (security experts will no doubt find that message).

~Ay-ay
NPB`

[Meenuh]

Also just to add, I suggest that you should DL secunia psi. It checks for outdated software that viruses and other malware can use to get in.

http://secunia.com/vulnerability_scanning/personal/

Oh and I believe the name of the worm is Conficker. Lol. Not Conflicker.

[NPB-XK]

Also just to add, I suggest that you should DL secunia psi. It checks for outdated software that viruses and other malware can use to get in.

http://secunia.com/vulnerability_scanning/personal/

Oh and I believe the name of the worm is Conficker. Lol. Not Conflicker.

I'm impressed by that suggestion. Hackers also rely on that tool to learn about exploits on programs in order to attack people. But there's also a tool which is a "darker" version. Can't mention about it here...
The most common program to update is not only an un-updated IE but also Adobe Acrobat Reader. So popular, yet it still has scary flaws. Most of the time, hackers exploit vulnerabilities from programs that can be used with internet. Not little stuff like minesweeper and stuff like that.

Conficker is the main original name... Conflicker is... hmmm well it has become a very popular mistake. Thanks to the medias.

[stoner beans]

http://www.soompi.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=283578

[Meenuh]

I'm impressed by that suggestion. Hackers also rely on that tool to learn about exploits on programs in order to attack people. But there's also a tool which is a "darker" version. Can't mention about it here...
The most common program to update is not only an un-updated IE but also Adobe Acrobat Reader. So popular, yet it still has scary flaws. Most of the time, hackers exploit vulnerabilities from programs that can be used with internet. Not little stuff like minesweeper and stuff like that.

Conficker is the main original name... Conflicker is... hmmm well it has become a very popular mistake. Thanks to the medias.

I'm a pretty paranoid person when it comes to my personal information and what not so I try to do what I can and do some research to protect myself. Haha. Dunno if that's a good or bad thing but I think my bf tends to get annoyed by my constant worrying about just about everything. Hahah.

I'm assuming that a lot of people have older versions of the flash player which should be updated.