Here's some info about this virus. It mentions the use of the word "humour"
in the subject line.
And I am so glad to know that our beloved Mrs. Cameron hasn't become an
alcoholic writer of bad haiku-like poetry. (I was worried until Les cleared
this up!)
--Bob
WORM WATCH
Evil e-mail tricks PC users
'Klez' disguises self with variety of subjects, senders
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Posted: April 25, 2002
1:00 a.m. Eastern
By Joe Kovacs
) 2002 WorldNetDaily.com
If you're seeing a sudden surge in the amount of e-mail in your inbox,
chances are it has little do with your popularity.
Delete buttons on personal computers are getting a workout this week thanks
to a tricky e-mail worm tunneling across America and the rest of the world.
Known as "Klez," the worm has been bombarding mailboxes with unsolicited
messages, replicating itself and changing its own appearance by displaying a
variety of subjects and senders.
"It's a worm that spreads really quickly," said Sharon Ruckman, senior
director for anti-virus software maker Symantec's security response team.
"And it carries an additional payload that can do some damage."
That additional payload is a virus known as "Elkern," which tries to infect
other systems by sharing information. When combined with Klez, the two create
problems that go beyond large amounts of incoming mail.
"It can release confidential information on your system which is never a good
thing to have happen," Ruckman told WorldNetDaily. "It also has the ability
to remove anti-virus software."
Klez is more deceptive than some previous problem e-mails, as it has a wide
variety of titles displayed in the subject line, and can latch on to an
e-mail address of someone a user knows and insert it in the "From" field,
making users more apt to open it and thus get infected.
Some of the titles listed in infected mails include:
a.. how are you
b.. let's be friends
c.. darling
d.. so cool a flash,enjoy it
e.. your password
f.. honey
g.. some questions
h.. please try again
i.. welcome to my hometown
j.. The Garden of Eden
k.. introduction on ADSL
l.. meeting notice
m.. questionnaire
n.. congratulations
o.. sos!
p.. japanese girl VS playboy
q.. look,my beautiful girl friend
r.. eager to see you
s.. spice girls' vocal concert
t.. japanese lass' sexy pictures
Klez also uses some combinations of random words in subject lines, to make it
even more confusing. The random words include:
a.. new
b.. funny
c.. nice
d.. humour
e.. excite
f.. good
g.. powful
h.. WinXP
i.. IE 6.0
j.. W32.Elkern
k.. W32.Klez.E
l.. Symantec
m.. Mcafee
n.. F-Secure
o.. Sophos
p.. Trendmicro
q.. Kaspersky
Some messages even appear to be trying to help PC users by offering a patch
or removal tool for Klez or Elkern, but are nothing more than the worm
itself.
"They're trying to get people to open it," Ruckman said regarding the virus
writers' clever deception skills. She adds her company does not e-mail people
randomly with removal tools.
Symantec has ranked Klez at a category 3 medium risk on a scale of 1 to 5,
with 5 being the most dangerous.
"That means it's spreading in the wild more quickly, but it's not as serious
as [other viruses like] Melissa or LoveBug," Ruckman said. She also says the
Nimda virus which debuted last year is still problematic.
According to anti-virus software maker Trend Micro's world virus tracking
center, Elkern and Klez are currently the top two ranked viruses. In the past
24 hours, they are estimated to have infected over 400,000 files globally.
Several strategies can be employed in preventing computers from being
infected. Home PC users should avoid opening the messages and delete e-mails
with attachments, especially if something appears strange in the subject or
sender's line.
"Don't be curious about e-mail," Ruckman said. "Just delete it." Once
deleted, users should also empty their trash bins.
She also recommends having anti-virus software on your machine, plus the
"latest and greatest software patches," which can be downloaded from
Microsoft.
Corporate e-mail users can have their system administrators attack the
problem by filtering out certain attachments and subject lines at the gateway
of their mail servers.
If a computer has been infected, free removal tools are available from both
Symantec and Trend Micro.
But despite assurances from anti-virus companies, some organizations like ACT
Teleconferencing in Hong Kong are having trouble curing the problem.
"Irrespective of what Symantec or other vendors say, there has been no way to
stop this worm in the short term," Bob Deverell of ACT told the South China
Morning Post this week.
"We have been struggling to clean our machines," he said. "We haven't been
able to stop it and we're very competent."
