Sober worm shakes Windows security
A new variant of the Sober email worm (Sober-N) is spreading rapidly across the net, as an
infected ZIP attachment to messages written in German or English, and only infects Windows
machines. More than 86,700 emails containing the new Sober-N were sent to UK businesses since the early hours of Tuesday morning. Most anti-virus vendors rate Sober as a medium-risk worm. Sober-N is the fourteenth incarnation of a worm first seen in October 2003.
Standard defence precautions against viral attacks apply in defending against Sober-N: corporates should consider blocking executables at the gateway and update anti-virus signature definition files to detect the virus. Home users should also update anti-virus tools and resist the temptation to open suspicious-looking emails.
