Continuing our journey into the deadliest viruses in history and having met several so far, today we will make a stop in the year 2007 to remember, or get to know from the beginning, the Storm Worm.
This virus is a Trojan horse. It appeared in early 2007 and infects Microsoft Windows systems. It got its name from the fact that when it was transmitted via e-mail, its subject line warned of a deadly storm.
The infected computer can be used by hackers to spread the virus to other computers.
Storm Worm is a Trojan horse that affects computers using Microsoft operating systems, discovered on January 17, 2007.
The Storm Worm began infecting thousands of (mostly private) computers in Europe and the United States on Friday, January 19, 2007, using an email message with a subject line about a recent weather disaster, “230 dead as storm batters Europe.”
There were six consecutive waves of the attack over the weekend. As of January 22, 2007, the Storm Worm accounted for 8% of all malware infections worldwide. There is evidence, according to PCWorld, that the Storm Worm was of Russian origin, possibly by the Russian Enterprise Network.
The worm worked as follows: When an attachment is opened, the malware installs the wincom32 service, passing packets to destinations encoded within the malware itself.
The files had names like “postcard.exe” and “Flash postcard.exe,” with more changes as the attack mutated. Each infected computer becomes part of a botnet.
On September 7, 2007, estimates of the botnet's size ranged from 1–10 million computers.
You can also watch the related video:
Storm Worm, as we saw today, warned of extreme weather events… who can tell us who's next? Can you guess who it is?
Stay tuned to SecNews and you will discover it all.
