Security experts warn users to exercise caution against a computer worm exploiting the 2006 World Cup sporting event to spread.
Named Sixem-A, this computer worm began spreading across the internet at the start of this week. Security companies quickly managed to contain the virus, but it has still been detected on a significant number of computer systems within businesses.
This computer worm primarily targets English-speaking football fans, according to Graham Cluley, a senior technology consultant at Sophos.
The virus sends messages titled “Naked World Cup game set” or “Soccer fans killed five teens” and encourages users to click on a fake file masquerading as an image attached to an email. In reality, it is malware capable of disabling security software and downloading additional malicious software onto the victim’s system. Simultaneously, this worm will also send copies of itself to other addresses stored on the victim’s system.
The World Cup has become a trend…
Malware has become an integral part of the tradition surrounding recent World Cup tournaments. In 1998, malware that capitalized on the World Cup wiped out the hard drives of its victims. Then, four years later, the VBSChick-F virus exploited the World Cup, held for the first time in Asia – South Korea and Japan – to spread widely.
Cluley believes that online scammers will also join the fray in the next World Cup, likely by impersonating notifications to inform their victims that they have won a lottery related to the global sporting event in 2010 held in South Africa.
The widespread public interest provides opportunities for “social engineering” attacks. With such attacks, users inadvertently assist the attackers. “Users are too eager to watch the matches when they receive fake messages containing videos of Pamela Anderson or Paris Hilton or something similar.”
This year’s World Cup has seen a noticeable increase in malware compared to previous tournaments.
Hoang Dung
