VB Blog

Throwback Thursday: Olympic Games

Posted by   Helen Martin on   Aug 2, 2016

In 1994, along with the Olympic Games came an Olympic virus, from a group of Swedish virus authors calling themselves ‘Immortal Riot’. We look back at Mikko Hyppönen's analysis in the VB archive.

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VB2016 call for last-minute papers opened, discounts announced

Posted by   Martijn Grooten on   Aug 1, 2016

Announcing the VB2016 call for last-minute papers and a number of discounts on the conference registration rate.

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Guest Blog: Malicious Scripts Gaining Prevalence in Brazil

Posted by   Virus Bulletin on   Jul 28, 2016

In the run up to VB2016, we invited the conference sponsors to write guest posts for our blog. In the second of this series, ESET's Matías Porolli writes about malicious Visual Basic and JavaScript gaining prevalence in Brazil.

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Romanian university website compromised to serve Neutrino exploit kit

Posted by   Martijn Grooten on   Jul 28, 2016

The website of the Carol Davila University of Medicine and Pharmacy has been compromised to inject a hidden iframe into the site's source code that serves the Neutrino exploit kit and may infect visitors with ransomware.

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It's 2016. Can we stop using MD5 in malware analyses?

Posted by   Martijn Grooten on   Jul 26, 2016

While there are no actually risks involved in using MD5s in malware analyses, it reinforces bad habits and we should all start using SHA-256 instead.

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Throwback Thursday: Holding the Bady

Posted by   Helen Martin on   Jul 21, 2016

In 2001, ‘Code Red’ caused White House administrators to change the IP address of the official White House website, and even penetrated Microsoft’s own IIS servers.

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Paper: The Journey of Evasion Enters Behavioural Phase

Posted by   Martijn Grooten on   Jul 20, 2016

A new paper by FireEye researcher Ankit Anubhav provides an overview of evasion techniques applied by recently discovered malware.

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Guest blog: Espionage toolkit uncovered targeting Central and Eastern Europe

Posted by   Virus Bulletin on   Jul 15, 2016

Recently, ESET researchers uncovered a new espionage toolkit targeting targeting Central and Eastern Europe. They provide some details in a guest post.

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Avast acquires AVG for $1.3bn

Posted by   Martijn Grooten on   Jul 8, 2016

Anti-virus vendor Avast has announced the acquisition of its rival AVG for 1.3 billion US dollars.

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Throwback Thursday: You Are the Weakest Link, Goodbye!

Posted by   Helen Martin on   Jul 7, 2016

Passwords have long been a weak point in the security chain, despite efforts to encourage users to pick strong ones. 13 years ago, Martin Overton wrote an article highlighting the weakness and explaining why it is the human element that presents the biggest risk to computer security - something that rings as true today as it did 13 years ago.

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Search blog

MS sues UK spammer

Civil action avoids spam law technicalities.
Civil action avoids spam law technicalities.Microsoft has sued and reached an out-of-court settlement with UK spammer Paul Fox, after apparently despairing of finding any success… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/09/ms-sues-uk-spammer/

Subliminal message hidden in spam

Mail campaign aims to sneak into readers' subconscious minds.
Mail campaign aims to sneak into readers' subconscious minds. A spam campaign is using the classic 'submliminal message' technique in an attempt to implant thoughts in the minds of… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/09/subliminal-message-hidden-spam/

Nine years for spam felon

Tough sentence upheld despite free-speech claims.
Tough sentence upheld despite free-speech claims. A US man convicted two years ago under the state of Virginia's anti-spam laws has lost an appeal against his conviction. The case,… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/09/nine-years-spam-felon/

Word zero-day exploited

Trojan uses unpatched hole in office software.
Trojan uses unpatched hole in office software. At least one trojan has been seen in the wild exploiting a newly discovered vulnerability in Microsoft's Word 2000 software. The… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/09/word-zero-day-exploited/

Gromozon mystery clearing

Cleaner tool aims to remove sophisticated attack.
Cleaner tool aims to remove sophisticated attack. The shadowy blended threat known as Gromozon has slowly been gaining notoriety in recent weeks, particularly after some in-depth… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/09/gromozon-mystery-clearing/

Phishing on the rise

One in three malicious emails a phish, says MessageLabs.
One in three malicious emails a phish, says MessageLabs. A report on the current state of digital security has revealed that phishing scams constitute a growing danger to computer… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/09/phishing-rise/

Mobile snoopware labelled spyware

Future phone privacy threatened.
Future phone privacy threatened. Reports this week highlighted the problem of spyware running on mobile phones, and the consequences this could have for privacy. A commercial… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/09/mobile-snoopware-labelled-spyware/

New New Zealand spam laws to allow spam

Adjustments to laws may let 'non-commercial' spam continue.
Adjustments to laws may let 'non-commercial' spam continue. Recommendations have been made to dilute tough new anti-spam laws currently being debated by the New Zealand government.… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/09/new-new-zealand-spam-laws-allow-spam/

CA in Windows FP

eTrust identifies critical file as virus.
eTrust identifies critical file as virus. A mistake at CA caused some trouble over the weekend, as its eTrust products started identifying part of the Windows local authentication… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/09/ca-windows-fp/

More MS06-040 worries

Vulnerability still causing problems.
Vulnerability still causing problems. There have been further reports of malware spreading using the MS06-040 vulnerability, announced and patched three weeks ago on Microsoft's… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/09/more-ms06-040-worries/

AT&T hack led to spearphish

Stolen details used to trick victims out of further info.
Stolen details used to trick victims out of further info. Transaction details stolen as part of last weekend's security breach of a shopping site run by US phone giant AT&T were… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/09/amp-t-hack-led-spearphish/

A fine, a curfew and a treasure hunt

Round up of the month's spammer penalties.
Round up of the month's spammer penalties. Kicking off a round-up of some of the anti-spam penalties issued worldwide this month, the Chinese government has made an underwhelming… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/09/fine-curfew-and-treasure-hunt/

September issue of VB published

The September issue of Virus Bulletin is now available for subscribers to download.
The September issue of Virus Bulletin is now available for subscribers to download. The September 2006 issue of Virus Bulletin is now available for subscribers to browse online… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/09/september-issue-vb-published/

Spot that spammer

Quiz tests consumers' ability to identify spam causing sites.
Quiz tests consumers' ability to identify spam causing sites. Last month, McAfee invited web users to spot the undesirable website, in an eight-question quiz entitled: 'Can you… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/09/spot-spammer/

Nearly VB 100%

Near misses.
Near misses. In the recent Windows XP comparative review (see VB, June 2006, p.11), VB reported that VirusBuster failed to achieve the results required for a VB 100% award. After… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/09/nearly-vb-100/

Testing patience

Consumer Reports does it again.
Consumer Reports does it again. After having come in for a great deal of criticism in recent weeks over its AV testing methodology (see VB, September 2006, p.2), Consumer Reports… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/09/testing-patience/

Worm spreads via mobiles. Maybe.

PC malware thought capable of using phones as vector.
PC malware thought capable of using phones as vector.F-Secure has reported a new worm which attempts to spread via mobile phones. The 'Mobler' worm, once activated, copies itself… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/09/worm-spreads-mobiles-maybe/

September

Anti-virus and security related news provided by independent anti-virus advisors, Virus Bulletin
https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/09/

Future browsers battle phishing

Microsoft and Mozilla's upcoming new versions to include safety measures.
Microsoft and Mozilla's upcoming new versions to include safety measures. Pre-release versions of both Mozilla FireFox 2 and Microsoft Internet Explorer 7 have been unveiled,… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/09/future-browsers-battle-phishing/

eBay phishing ups its game

Decent spelling and convincing design aim to trick users.
Decent spelling and convincing design aim to trick users. Users of eBay, perennial subject of phishing scams, are currently being targeted by a more than usually well-crafted… https://www.virusbulletin.com/blog/2006/08/ebay-phishing-ups-its-game/

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