'Storm Worm' Reportedly Spreading Quickly


POSTED: 4:56 pm CST January 22, 2007

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Antivirus firm Symantec has raised a warning about a new computer worm called Trojan.Peacomm, also known as Storm Worm.


The company said the virus first appeared Jan. 17 and has spread rapidly, making it a moderate level 3 threat. There are five levels in the company's system.


Spreading through e-mail, the malicious code includes subject lines such as "A killer at 11, he's free at 21 and kill again!" "U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has kicked German Chancellor Angela Merkel," and variations of word of Chinese or Russian missiles shooting down various aircraft.


The e-mails contain files with .exe attachments that contain the virus.


Symantec said the virus appears to originate from Russia and is intended to pump up the price of penny stocks.


Symantec said no threat has spread this fast since the Sober worm in May 2005.


More details are available on Symantec's Web site (http://www.symantec.com/enterprise/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid=2007-011917-1403-99).<!--stopindex-->

Thanks Karried! I had seen a couple of these emails in my inbox and deleted them. But now I know what they were. Thanks for the alert! :)