Sasser Worm Infects Thousands of Computers Worldwide

Bloomberg ^ | May 3, 2004

[FourPeas]

May 3 (Bloomberg) -- A computer worm called Sasser may have infected hundreds of thousands of computers through the Internet and is still spreading, possibly disrupting business today, a security software expert said.

The worm, which is different than a virus because it doesn't need to be attached to an e-mail to spread, causes a computer to shut down and then reboot several times, apparently without causing any permanent damage, said Mikko Hyppoenen, director of virus research with Helsinki-based F-Secure Oyj. The worm was detected Saturday at 4 a.m. Finnish time, he said.

[fishtank]

[j_tull]

I'm fighting it now. We couldn't patch any of our Dell C400's becuase they won't boot with the patch installed. Sux.

[rewrite]

I'm proud to say I helped vote this worm out of the Senate.

[Monty22]

You know, I'm not really that happy with Trend Micro's software. Everytime I boot, after installing mirc, it'll say it cleans up an irc.backdoor.trojan.

I've been emailing them for weeks, and it's obviously a false positive. I reinstalled XP from scratch, put their software on, and the instant I did a fresh mirc install, blammo again. I also get some other weird 'cleanups' that I'm not sure are correct.

I'm thinking of going to Panda. Anyone know how that one rates?

[AxelPaulsenJr]

It's all about the dafffffffffacit.

[Clemenza]

Last night, I cleaned Sasser off my sistem. It was screwing up my OS for TWO WEEKS. After an hour on the phone with Microsoft, I was able to clear it.

[Danette]

I don't have it, but how would I get rid of it if I did?

[PigRigger]

"Sasser Worm Infects Thousands of Computers Worldwide....



Back in the late 80's & early 90's Sasser infected the Mets.

[FourPeas]

And, an interesting tidbit from the f-secure site:

The Netsky Connection Posted by Mikko @ 05:18 GMT
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

New variant of Netsky (Netsky.AC, the 29th variant) was found last night. Nothing new in there.

However, this variant contains this text embedded in the code, which we will be posting publicly although we normally don't do this:

Hey, av firms, do you know that we have programmed the sasser virus?!?.
Yeah thats true! Why do you have named it sasser?
A Tip: Compare the FTP-Server code with the one from Skynet.V!!!
LooL! We are the Skynet...

[Psycho_Bunny]

My mother's sooooo cutting edge...so ahead of the curve...she caught it Wednesday night....on dial-up.

DON'T READ THIS PART MOM

I'd built her a new computer and forgot to enable the firewall so it's my fault she got it but, that's our little secret.

 

[Arthalion]

This will no doubt explode today across the Internet. The spread of this virus has been "slow" for a reason...it was released on a weekend, so most business machines were simply turned off. As these PC's are powered up for the coming work week...boom.

Where I work, the operations guys were given carte blanche after the last rounds of worm infections to keep it from happening again. Using a combination of intelligent routers, carefully located segmenting firewalls, VLANS, and a new forced update system to keep everyone patched up, we're crossing our fingers that this one wont hit us in any significant way.

[FourtySeven]

For a techno dummy like me:

I don't understand how this spreads if not through e-mail? Anyone know?

[Billthedrill]

Just cleaned it off a consultant's computer (NOT one on our network) - it was rebooting his system every 60 seconds with a LSASS.EXE error message. Minor annoyance except to that poor guy, who's lost half a day's work.

@#%^$#$!!! script kiddies...

[mass55th]

"I don't have it, but how would I get rid of it if I did? "

Buy a Mac.

[Billthedrill]

FWIW - HERE are Microsoft's instructions for getting rid of the little SOB...

[al_c]

Buy a Mac.

Don't start that. I have been a Mac user for well over 15 years and I have had my share of viruses. Not many, but enough to be annoyed by them. And now that the Mac uses Unix, they are now even more of a target.

[sandpit]

Got that little bugger last night. Blamed it on the computer newbie husband (he doesn't know I hadn't registed Norton yet).
I think I'll make him cook dinner while I fixing it.

[FourPeas]

See #16.

[brownsfan]

"Buy a Mac. "

"Don't start that. I have been a Mac user for well over 15 years and I have had my share of viruses. Not many, but enough to be annoyed by them. And now that the Mac uses Unix, they are now even more of a target."

Save your energy. Mac users are zealots. They are insecure that they are out of step with the rest of the world, so they cover it with that elitist attitude. Not surprising that Mac users tend to be liberal! :)