Storm Botnet Returns As Part of New Year's Attacks

Trailrunner7 writes "A new spam campaign that appeared shortly before the New Year is part of a new effort by the crew behind the Storm/Waledac botnet and is using some rather elementary tactics — in combination with fast-flux — to attempt to compromise unsuspecting users. The new attack emerged late last week and is fronted by a fairly lame spam campaign that is sending millions of emails that appear to be holiday e-cards, one of the older and more threadbare techniques in this particular game. According to an analysis of the attack by the researchers at the Shadowserver Foundation, victims who click on the link in the email are directed to one of a number of compromised domains, which then redirect the user to another page that displays a message asking the user to download a fake Flash player. This, of course, installs a piece of malware on the victim's machine."

Comments

This, of course, installs a piece of malware on

[makubesu]

the victim's machine

So it installs flash?

Re:This, of course, installs a piece of malware on

[msauve]

"So it installs flash?"

Steve Jobs, is that really you?!

Old?

[girlintraining]

...one of the older and more threadbare techniques in this particular game.

Criminals don't care how old it is, but rather how successful it is. Please try to remember that, people. Technology doesn't have to be new or complicated to be useful, and deriding it because it is older is telling of a lack of experience with the thing. Spam will continue to be effective because it only costs a few dollars to register a domain, a little bit less to setup a distribution point, and once you have a few compromised hosts, it pays for itself -- and then some.

Bunny

[Anonymous Coward]

From: Joe User (sksj3838lsk@reallywarmmail.com)
To: You
Subject: Bunny
Attachment: bunnyhop.exe

Hey check out this cool bunny, it hops around the screen and follows your mouse pointer, it sometimes hides behind windows! Just double-click on the attachement.

Bye!
Joe

Re:Upon conviction of virus writing....

[jamesh]

HARD LABOR, not some wimpy country club prison.

On slashdot we refer to such prisons as "federal pound-me-in-the-ass prison" and "white collar resort prison" respectively.

Re:Is there a way to do this in a benign way?

[Anonymous Coward]

You should also get your resume current except for the last bit of coding you're doing.