Security news
Security news19 June 2003
Sobig-D worm is no big deal
The W32/Sobig-D worm, first seen on 18 June, is proving not to be as successful at spreading as its earlier variants.
The worm spreads via email using a variety of subject lines and attachment names, and can also propagate through network shares. Earlier versions of the worm, such as W32/Sobig-C and W32/Sobig-B, would sometimes pretend to come from Bill Gates at Microsoft or Microsoft technical support.
"This latest version of the Sobig worm does not appear currently to be spreading anything like as quickly as its earlier incarnations," said Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant for Sophos Anti-Virus. "However, our advice to computer users remains the same: keep your virus protection up-to-date and be wary of opening unsolicited email attachments. Businesses should seriously consider blocking unwanted executable content from coming into their company at the email gateway."
Sophos recommends companies consider blocking all executable code at their email gateway. It is rarely necessary to allow users to receive programs via email from the outside world. There is so little to lose, and so much to gain, simply by blocking all emailed programs, regardless of whether they contain viruses or not. Users of Sophos MailMonitor for SMTP can achieve this through its threat reduction capability.
