Virus Update: No apologies in November

Anti-virus vendors continued to get a taste of their own medicine in November as W32/Apology - otherwise known as TROJ_MTX - hung on at the top of the virus list.

By Sally Watson, 1 December 2000 16:46

NEWS The Trojan horse, which installs a backdoor application in the system and blocks its victims access to anti-vendor websites, became increasingly prevalent throughout the month. According to anti-virus vendor Trend Micro, companies in Asia and North America were worst hit, and Europe had over 170,000 reported infections during the month. There was a strong challenge for the top spot from newcomer Navidad, an internet worm hidden in the email attachment EMANUEL.EXE. And old favourites Kakworm and Loveletter - both visual basic scripts - also kept IT managers busy. Most vendors are already warning about increasing numbers of viruses in the run up to Christmas. One already spreading festive cheer is W32/Music, which masquerades as a Christmas tune. Graham Cluely, senior technology consultant at Sophos, warned the proliferation of .exe viruses like Navidad prove users are still uneducated. "The message not to open unsolicited email attachments still needs to be pushed home," he said.

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