Valentine's Brings Along 'Viruses'
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Like every other year, this year too, security experts warn of worms coming as romantic messages in emails, and invading PCs belonging to unsuspecting users.
PandaLabs has already detected a worm, they've dubbed "Nurech.A", which hides in emails with subjects like "Together You and I," "Till the End of Time," and "Heart of Mine". The malware comes in an executable attached file with names such as flash postcard.exe or greeting postcard.exe.
There's also the "Nuwar.D" that arrives in messages with subjects such as "5 reasons I love you" or "A kiss for you".
Luis Corrons, Technical Director of PandaLabs, advises, as a general rule, don't open any suspicious email, regardless of what it says it contains. Instead of going by instinct, let a security solution decide whether the mail is safe or not to open.
Security majors also warn about important details like bank accounts and passwords being compromised - what with so many Valentine's gifts being bought online. Not to mention the old phishing tactic of using junk mail or false Web pages to lead users to fake banking/shopping Web sites that ask for confidential information.
Corron suggests that users type addresses directly in the browser's address bar, instead of clicking on links that arrive by email. Corrons says no bank would request account details through email, meaning any such email must be treated as an attempt at phishing.
And, for those who want to make sure their computers haven't already been attacked by any of these malwares, they can use ActiveScan available for free at http://www.pandaspftware.com/activescan.
