More fake anti-virus attacks spammed out

by Graham Cluley on December 5, 2008 | Comments Off

Filed Under: Malware, Spam

We saw yet another example of an email-based scareware (fake anti-virus software) campaign this morning, which has also caught the eye of AusCERT.

The bad guys are sending out messages with the subject line "Important message for you", posing as a support desk, and saying that your computer has been identified as being infected by a file-infecting virus (which they call W.744.A). This one goes so far as to name check Sophos, as well as the folks at Symantec, McAfee, Avira and Kaspersky.

Fake anti-virus attack

Of course, the website and product that the email links to are designed to hornswoggle you, and compromise your computer systems.

We detect the malware linked to in these email as Troj/FakeVir-HX. But if you are running our email or web protection solutions then they are also intercepted. Users of other anti-virus products might be wise to check with their vendor whether protection is available.

PS. You have to laugh at the lines "We do not have the best coders in the world" and "Tested for 2 years, making it almost the best only for you".

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About the author

Graham Cluley has worked in the computer security industry for more than 20 years, developing anti-virus software and doing quite a lot of talking about internet threats. He's won awards for his blogging, but is proudest of the text adventure games he wrote when he was still wearing short trousers. You can learn more about those (the games, not the trousers) at grahamcluley.com. Send Graham an email, subscribe to his updates on Facebook, follow him on Twitter and App.net, and circle him on Google Plus for regular updates.