Posted on 01/13/2005 6:15:02 AM PST by yankeedame
Last Updated: Thursday, 13 January, 2005, 11:29 GMT
Windows worm travels with Tetris
Users are being warned about a Windows virus that poses as the hugely popular Tetris game. The Cellery worm installs a playable version of the classic falling blocks game on PCs that it has infected.
While users play the game, the worm spends its time using the machine to search for new victims to infect on nearby networks.
The risk of infection by Cellery is thought to be very low as few copies of the worm have been found in the wild.
Protect yourself
The Cellery worm does not spread via e-mail like many other viruses. Instead it browses computer networks for PCs that have not shut off all the insecure ways they connect to other machines.
When it infects a machine, Cellery installs a version of Tetris that users can play. As the game starts up the worm also starts a music file to accompany it.
At the same time the virus starts scouring networks for other vulnerable machines.
The virus does no damage to machines but heavily infected networks could slow down as scanning traffic builds. Productivity may suffer too if users spend time playing Tetris.
PCs running Windows 95, 98, ME, NT, 2000, and XP could be vulnerable to the worm.
"If your company has a culture of allowing games to be played in the office, your staff may believe this is simply a new game that has been installed - rather than something that should cause concern," said Graham Cluley, spokesman for anti-virus firm Sophos.
So far the number of people infected by Cellery is thought to be very small and the risks of further infection is very low.
Sophos urged users and companies to update their anti-virus software to keep themselves protected.
I have got to keep this away from my mom.
Productivity may suffer too if users spend time playing Tetris.
Now this is not somethign you can blame on the virus!
FYI ping
Back in the late 80's, we had a version of it that ran on Unix and you played it on dumb terminals.
Thanks for the ping!
ROFL!
Sorry for all the pings this morning.
Those bastards! Taking something as great as Tetris and making it into a virus.
No problem! I find all of your pings interesting - the breeder one today was particularly interesting to me!!!
With all the free and excellent firewalls and virus protection and everything, I am shocked at how many people still get infected with viruses. I am truly amazed also at how many people still open email and download attachments from people yhet don't know or don't have the email scanned first. I know a person who got fired from 2 different jobs for opening personal email at work and infecting the companies computer networks. She has also had it happen to her 3 or 4 times at home too.
Thanks. I just got a chuckle with all the 'thanks for the pings' in a row and I thought, 'my goodness, I didn't realize I pinged that much this morning!'
Let me know if I fill the my comments box too much!
Viral Tetris - Yet another reason to be glad to be microsoft free!
LOLOLOL! I will. Actually, I do get multiple pings to the same thread and will often not check the second or third time. So if you don't get an acknowledgement it is probably because I've been there before.
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