PUP-installing Toolbar - the Most Common Malware

In the fourth week of August 2007, 28% of computers had some form of malware infection. And of the ten malware detected, eight were Potentially Unwanted Program, or PUP.

Panda Security scanned computers at the www.infectedornot.com site in the fourth week of August 2007 to find that for computers with protection installed, 28% had infection due to some form of malware. On the other hand, for computers without installed protection, the infection was found in 40% PCs.

Panda Security's online scanner, TotalScan, used for detecting latent and active malware found MyWebSearch as the most frequent malware in the fourth week of August 2007. MyWebSearch malware is a Potentially Unwanted Program, commonly referred to as PUP. It maliciously installs a toolbar capable of distorting results that search engines display and redirects computer users to various Web pages belonging to vendors.

Of the ten malicious codes that TotalScan detected, eight are Potentially Unwanted Programs. One reason for the large distribution of the PUP malware is that users generally think they are harmless. However, there is still a chance for breach of individual's privacy, and some users are able to remove another malicious code, such as 'troyanos', from their infected systems, said Luis Corrons, Technical Director of PandaLabs. Pandasoftware published this in news on August 31, 2007.

PandaLabs found another type of malware, the IRCPass.A, which is crafted to let a cyber offender acquire control of computers having infection via HTTP and to grab their passwords.

PandaLabs talks of yet another malicious code in its report. It is the worm MSNFunny.B that proliferates through MSN Messenger. The worm spreads infection by first closing all active MSN Messenger Windows and then sending the user's contacts, a message having a .zip file attached. The text in the message lures users to click open the attached file. There could be several languages to write the text, for e.g.: "lol you got to see this" or "viu este?" referring to system updates. The entire process of infection increases the PC's vulnerability to more attacks.

PandaLabs found another worm called the Sohanat.CU which too spreads through MSN instant messaging. For that, the worm randomly sends messages to contact addresses on the user's computer. But these are only those contacts that are actively connected to the program while the malware runs.

Related article: PUP – Rapidly Increasing Computer Threat

» SPAMfighter News - 9/15/2007