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New worm threat

By Tracy Burrows, ITWeb contributor.
Johannesburg, 12 May 2004

No sooner has the alleged author of Sasser worm confessed than a new Internet worm threat has emerged.

F-Secure has issued a Radar Level 2 alert about the new Wallon worm, which is spreading mostly in Europe.

It does not arrive in an attachment, but in an HTML-based message containing a link to a site that downloads and runs the worm`s components. In order to spoof the original Web location, F-Secure says it uses the Yahoo redirection service.

It emerged only a day after 18-year-old German student Sven Jaschan confessed to authoring the widespread Sasser worm, which arrived via the Internet instead of via e-mail. Jaschan is also believed to have been involved in creating the Netsky virus.

It is speculated that the youth created the devastating viruses to boost his mother`s small PC help business. Sasser variants are still spreading globally, and are estimated to have infected tens of millions of PCs.

Related stories:
Sasser author confesses, more arrests possible
Mutated-Sasser fears
Sasser explosion linked to Netsky
New worm straight from the Net

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