- Email: [email protected]
Document describing virus contains one
Computers & Security, Vol. 14, No. 6
caught six hackers by luring them to sell secrets over the Internet. The Newark, New Jersey office of the US Secret Service, which ran the operation for eight months said that the hackers used the Internet and a private bulletin board service to deal in stolen cellular phone and credit card data worth millions ofdollars.The thieves stole the numbers used to encode cellular phones. When those numbers are programmed into other phones, the resulting ‘clones’can be used to make unauthorized calls by impersonating the original phone. An undercover agent established a bogus bulletin board called ‘Celco 51’ which was used to solicit the sale of stolen cellular phone codes. Computer security experts said the technique is badly needed to curb cybercrimes, which are growing every year. ‘Operation Cybersnare’ caught the hackers and led to the seizure of 20 computers in seven states. The six are charged with a variety of crimes dealing with the fraudulent use of cellular telephone systems. American businesses are losing $3.5 billion annually to communications fraud, and computer and communications systems managers often overlook the threats from their own employees. Computen~orld, September 18, 1995, p. 12.
generates a message which says, “And finally I would like to say: stop all French nuclear testing in the Pacific”. A further worrying development is the fact that the Word file was encrypted, making it difficult to identify a virus. Like the original Winword.concept version, the new strain ofthe virus takes the form ofa macro, written in the language of the Microsoft Word package. Microsoft has said that the company would have a short-term fix available which would warn users ifa document they were about to open contained macros and allow them to clean them first. Computer Weekly, September28, 1995. Document describing virus contains one. On the computer security newsgroups on the Internet, Fridrik Skulason discusses further developments to the Word document-infecting virus saga. There is now a new threat. On NETCOM.COM there is a freely available document that describes this virus however, that document is itself infected with a new Word virus, which is not detectable by the methods used to detect the first one.
America Online girds against hacker break-ins. America Online has asked users to regularly change their passwords as one measure to guard against ‘ongoing’ security breaches. One or more hackers have created a program called AOHell that has been trying to invade files of America Online members and staff for several months. The company has installed new security software to help counteract the invasions. Co~~puterwor~d, September 11, 1995, p. 8.
The virus infects NORMAL.DOT, and spreads to each file being saved or (possibly) printed. For obvious reasons the name or location of the file is not revealed, but it has already been provided to NETCOM.COM administrators. As NETCOM.COM has a policy of allowing their users to distribute any material they want, including computer viruses, it cannot seriously be expected that they will interfere or remove this file. It is recommended that everybody should be extremely cautious in downloading Word.DOC files from NETCOM.COM or other virus distribution sites on the Internet. Nefwork Security,September 1995, p. 5.
Malicious Word virus found on the Internet, Bill Boyle.A malicious version of the virus which attaches itself to Microsoft Word documents was discovered on the Internet by a charity, The discovery confirms the worst fears of anti-virus experts, who had warned that the original benign virus could be altered to become potentially destructive. The virus found by the charity contains a payload which deletes system files when the PC’s clock reaches 5 April. It was found on a WWW site called Concept.Nuclear macro, which purports to be an information file on French nuclear testing in the Pacific. Once activated it attempts to kill the DOS IO.sys, MS.sys and COMMAND.COM files, altering them to zero bytes. If the user attempts to print a fde it
Safe secret, Ken Mann. Fears over hacking and viruses have never been greater. Yet a European certification scheme which was designed to give peace of mind to buyers of security products remains largely unknown. ITSEC stands for information technology security evaluation criteria. The UK version includes tests and evaluation procedures carried out by an independent authority information technology security evaluation facility (ITSEF) on security products. After evaluation, a product is certified that it can achieve a defined level ofinformation security. The major benefit to users is that an independent authority has verified that a product actually delivers the security that the vendor claims for it. ITSEC is striving to raise general
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caught six hackers by luring them to sell secrets over the Internet. The Newark, New Jersey office of the US Secret Service, which ran the operation for eight months said that the hackers used the Internet and a private bulletin board service to deal in stolen cellular phone and credit card data worth millions ofdollars.The thieves stole the numbers used to encode cellular phones. When those numbers are programmed into other phones, the resulting ‘clones’can be used to make unauthorized calls by impersonating the original phone. An undercover agent established a bogus bulletin board called ‘Celco 51’ which was used to solicit the sale of stolen cellular phone codes. Computer security experts said the technique is badly needed to curb cybercrimes, which are growing every year. ‘Operation Cybersnare’ caught the hackers and led to the seizure of 20 computers in seven states. The six are charged with a variety of crimes dealing with the fraudulent use of cellular telephone systems. American businesses are losing $3.5 billion annually to communications fraud, and computer and communications systems managers often overlook the threats from their own employees. Computen~orld, September 18, 1995, p. 12.
generates a message which says, “And finally I would like to say: stop all French nuclear testing in the Pacific”. A further worrying development is the fact that the Word file was encrypted, making it difficult to identify a virus. Like the original Winword.concept version, the new strain ofthe virus takes the form ofa macro, written in the language of the Microsoft Word package. Microsoft has said that the company would have a short-term fix available which would warn users ifa document they were about to open contained macros and allow them to clean them first. Computer Weekly, September28, 1995. Document describing virus contains one. On the computer security newsgroups on the Internet, Fridrik Skulason discusses further developments to the Word document-infecting virus saga. There is now a new threat. On NETCOM.COM there is a freely available document that describes this virus however, that document is itself infected with a new Word virus, which is not detectable by the methods used to detect the first one.
America Online girds against hacker break-ins. America Online has asked users to regularly change their passwords as one measure to guard against ‘ongoing’ security breaches. One or more hackers have created a program called AOHell that has been trying to invade files of America Online members and staff for several months. The company has installed new security software to help counteract the invasions. Co~~puterwor~d, September 11, 1995, p. 8.
The virus infects NORMAL.DOT, and spreads to each file being saved or (possibly) printed. For obvious reasons the name or location of the file is not revealed, but it has already been provided to NETCOM.COM administrators. As NETCOM.COM has a policy of allowing their users to distribute any material they want, including computer viruses, it cannot seriously be expected that they will interfere or remove this file. It is recommended that everybody should be extremely cautious in downloading Word.DOC files from NETCOM.COM or other virus distribution sites on the Internet. Nefwork Security,September 1995, p. 5.
Malicious Word virus found on the Internet, Bill Boyle.A malicious version of the virus which attaches itself to Microsoft Word documents was discovered on the Internet by a charity, The discovery confirms the worst fears of anti-virus experts, who had warned that the original benign virus could be altered to become potentially destructive. The virus found by the charity contains a payload which deletes system files when the PC’s clock reaches 5 April. It was found on a WWW site called Concept.Nuclear macro, which purports to be an information file on French nuclear testing in the Pacific. Once activated it attempts to kill the DOS IO.sys, MS.sys and COMMAND.COM files, altering them to zero bytes. If the user attempts to print a fde it
Safe secret, Ken Mann. Fears over hacking and viruses have never been greater. Yet a European certification scheme which was designed to give peace of mind to buyers of security products remains largely unknown. ITSEC stands for information technology security evaluation criteria. The UK version includes tests and evaluation procedures carried out by an independent authority information technology security evaluation facility (ITSEF) on security products. After evaluation, a product is certified that it can achieve a defined level ofinformation security. The major benefit to users is that an independent authority has verified that a product actually delivers the security that the vendor claims for it. ITSEC is striving to raise general
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