According to IT Observer, the widespread Sober email virus that infected millions of computers in 2005 has a variant scheduled to make another large-scale attack on January 5th 2006. This date also happens to be the 87th anniversary of the founding of the Nazi party, making this malicious software as much a political statement as an internet threat.
In other news, C|Net News.com is reporting on an instant messenger threat that’s labeled IM.Myspace04.AIM by the IM security vendor, IMLogic, that discovered the new threat.
This particular piece of malicious software is actually programmed to strike up random conversations with AOL Instant Messenger users using a pre-programmed script. The worm attempts to convince the potential victim into clicking on a web link to a supposed picture file, which is really a copy of itself in disguise.
As usual, computer owners are reminded to make sure that they are running both antivirus and antispyware programs on their computers and that they take the time to ensure that those protections, as well as Windows itself, have all the latest security updates from their developers.