NO APRIL FOOL'S TRICK - April Fool's Day Possible Virus Attack

I came across plurk messages of friends downloading antivirus. I was not aware of the April Fool's possible virus attack news that came up several days ago.

Well I might take a fast of my internet browsing then tomorrow... So folks be careful with your internet browsing just the same...

So I am posting here links about those news:


March 24, 2009 -- Updated 1215 GMT (2015 HKT)
No joke in April Fool's Day computer worm


(CNN) -- A computer-science detective story is playing out on the Internet as security experts try to hunt down a worm called Conficker C and prevent it from damaging millions of computers on April Fool's Day.

The anti-worm researchers have banded together in a group they call the Conficker Cabal. Members are searching for the malicious software program's author and for ways to do damage control if he or she can't be stopped.

They're motivated in part by a $250,000 bounty from Microsoft and also by what seems to be a sort of Dick Tracy ethic.

"We love catching bad guys," said Alvin Estevez, CEO of Enigma Software Group, which is one of many companies trying to crack Conficker. "We're like former hackers who like to catch other hackers. To us, we get almost a feather in our cap to be able to knock out that worm. We slap each other five when we're killing those infections."

The malicious program already is thought to have infected between 5 million and 10 million computers.


Click link/source for more:

Source:
http://edition.cnn.com/2009/TECH/03/24/conficker.computer.worm/


----------

Tuesday, March 24, 2009
The Times/Fox News

The Conficker Internet worm could strike at infected computers around the world on April 1, a security expert warned Monday.

Conficker is a sophisticated piece of malicious computer software, or malware, that installs itself on a Windows PC's hard drive via specially written Web pages. It then conceals itself on a computer.

Graham Cluley of the British security firm Sophos confirmed that Conficker is programmed "to hunt for new instructions on April 1."

However, he added, "This does not mean that anything is going to happen, or that the worm is actually going to do anything. Simply, it is scheduled to hunt a wider range of Web sites for instructions on that date."

One strange thing about Conficker is that no one yet has any idea what it is programmed to do.

In February, Cluley told The Times: "It's as if someone is assembling an army of computers around the world, but hasn't yet decided where to point them."

A worst-case scenario for April 1 would be for all the world's millions of infected computers to receive simultaneous instructions to attack, or to flood the Internet with spam e-mail.


Click source/link for more:
Source: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,510296,00.html