Expert warns of Christmas virus

greenspun.com : LUSENET : Grassroots Information Coordination Center (GICC) : One Thread

Expert warns of Christmas virus

From AAP 23dec00

16:15 (AEDT) COMPUTER users have been warned to look out for a virus that is expected to become active on Christmas Day and could destroy their computer.

Sunshine Coast-based computer expert Peter Daley said the Kriz virus was a new variant of a virus which was rampant on the Internet in 1998.

Mr Daley said the virus, which affected computers running Windows 98, NT and 2000, was passed on as an email attachment and latched itself onto portable executable (PE) files and resided in the computer's Random Access Memory (RAM).

"It infects all files opened by the user on Christmas Day," he said.

The virus could erase hard disk sectors and override the bios (internal operating instructions) on the computer's motherboard, preventing the computer from starting.

"If it manages that, you might as well chuck the PC away," Mr Daley said.

He recommended computer users with virus protection software download the latest upgrade from their software producer's website as soon as possible.

Mr Daley said computer users receiving an email with an attachment should always check with the sender whether they intended to send the attachment.

He said many viruses simply piggy-backed on emails without the sender knowing.

Users should particularly look out for attached files ending in the extensions .exe, .zip, .vdx, .xlf, and .doc.

"They are the most common extensions for viruses," Mr Daley said.

He recommended all Internet users run a virus checker on their computers.

"They should also have a good understanding of how they can get their machines infected and the sorts of things to look out for," he said.

http://news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,1548433%255E1702,00.html

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), December 23, 2000


Moderation questions? read the FAQ