New Spam Campaign Using School Reunion Method to Infect Computers

A research conducted by Trend Micro, an online security firm, says that spam mails are sent to school reunions, masquerading as invitations. Reportedly, these invitations are sent from classmates.com.

The reports informed that receivers of the mails are directed to click on an attached link to get more information on the reunion and also view a related video.

The security firm says that the mails are sent by spam bots which used dynamic IPs from various broadband ISPs and dialup. Trend Micro discovered the file as TROJ_AGENT.ADB.

According to Florabel Baetiong, an Anti spam Research Engineer, by clicking on the link, users are led to a harmful webpage. On this page, users are lure to install a Adobe player to see the reunion video; thus, deceiving them into running a harmful file, as reported by SCMagazine on January 2, 2009.

Florabel also claimed the Trojan virus connects to a URL to install TSPY_AGENT.AHCN. It is another kind of spyware that acquires details like IE (Internet Explorer) passwords and WinInetCacheCredentials which saves usernames and passwords for websites.

The researchers also disclosed that this kind of spyware is very dangerous for users' personal details, which is, further, used by hackers for harmful objectives. TSPY_AGENT.AHCN also contains rootkit features that can hide its files and processes from a user.

Researchers at Trend Micro added since November 2008, they have been seeing a rise in social networking malware aimed at deceiving users into clicking on a link which appears familiar, as it usually comes through internal messages functionality of social networking websites.

Further, security researchers commented that this is the first spam attack of 2009 making use of social engineering techniques and technologies to circulate malware. Interestingly, security experts have already estimated that social engineering techniques will increase in 2009.

Trend Micro advises that web users should always be warned about viewing uninvited mails. Installing unfamiliar files and clicking on unknown links lead to malware installation on systems.

Related article: New Zealand Releases Code To Reduce Spam

» SPAMfighter News - 1/7/2009