US Government to Curb Chinese Hacking

ABC News Tonight reported that US officials admit the Chinese broke into Pentagon computers successfully. Dallas Computer Repair has seen a dramatic increase in trojans as the war wages on from cyber attacks. The last computer scanned produced and initial 153 trojans and a reboot scan pulled up another 91 trojans. The spyware and adware on the computer was numbered at 253 pieces. The whole attack ended up destroying the boot record that could not be repaired without reinstalling the full system.

The computer contained client data with credit cards, names and addresses. The client was informed that such data was critical to being protected at the fullest extent. I don't think the client understood or refused to understand the need to go out of the way and spend the necessary time and resources to secure the data. That will be in the report/invoice that will be sent to the client without doubt.

New Worm Targeting Skype

Skype users should be aware that a new worm is targeting the software by using the chat function to send a message to users about a link to a .jpg that is ready for downloading. The user will then see a dialog box that will ask to 'save or run' a .scr file that should be ignored, according to an article on InformationWeek.

The worm is said to be spreading globally in an alarming rate.

Hacked by the Chinese Again

Reports are coming about again how the Chinese are attempting to infiltrate our infrastructure in the United States. They have been recently caught in June trying to gain access to the Pentagon, according to FinancialTimes.com and also have been unofficially caught attempting to gain access to our Naval Intelligence in Alabama as we reported several weeks ago.

Our own website, Dallas Computer Repair, was infiltrated and attempts to cause confusion and duplication within the search engine Google was attempted. The hackers attempted to drop executable files that were noticed and immediately deleted. We are always on the lookout for devious attempts at hijacks within our site and will remain vigilent.

Storm Worm Takes 13 Hour Break Then Reheats

Storm Worm took a 13 hour break over the Labor Day Holiday just to restart with new twists. The new worm campaign began with emails sent to accounts that had a link to a 'Happy Labor Day' greeting card that was a link to a malicious site, according to Dallas Computer Service. There scripts were executed that took advantage of exploits in Microsoft products, QuickTime and WinZip.

Another twist was that emails were sent that proclaimed particular musical artists had released a new video on YouTube that even MTV had not received yet.

Solution: Do Not open emails from unknown senders.

Firefox V.3 Combats Malicious Sites

According to Dallas Computer Repair, Firefox V.3, due out toward the end of the year, will combat malicious sites that attempt to download malware, usually trojans, onto unsuspecting users computers. Sophos reported that 5,000 new malicious sites were created in April but by June the number of new sites jumped to 30,000.

Dallas computer repair has seen an increase in the number of computers coming into the shop for virus removal. One problem is that users are letting their anti-virus expire and after infection are having difficulty removing the malware even with newly installed and updated anti-virus scanners.

Solution: do not go to suspect sites via emails, keep anti-virus definition database updated, do not open emails whose sender is unknown.

Storm Worm- Largest Botnet in Internet's History

Storm Worm has increased its presence on worldwide computers to now number a mind boggling 1.7 million machines. It appears this is the largest botnet in history according to Dallas Computer Repair. Malicious malware writers are using social engineering into enticing unsuspecting users opening emails and then directing them to websites containing the trojan, Storm Worm.

Such a large botnet of computers would be able to take down a small countries internet and it could be used to attack larger institutions and organizations. It appears there has been Denial of Service (DOS) attacks on random IP addresses and that researchers also suspect that it was the Storm Worm that was used to attack the small country of Estonia bringing their internet to a halt.

Storm Worm Escalates

Dallas Computer Repair reports that Storm Worm has escalated to new heights within the last week. The worm erupted with over 200,000,000 emails sent out in just over a week that directed users to malicious websites where little content was offered but contained a downloader that put the malicious software onto the unsuspecting users computers. The goal of these malware authors is to create a large botnet that can also download fresh malicious software where the authors will control the computers to their advantage.

Last Thursday was the biggest day with between 24,000,000 and 26,000,000 malicious emails sent compared to this last Tuesday where security experts predicted between 4-6 million malicious emails where Storm Worm constitutes 99% of the malicious software.

"Phish and Chips" Bust Nets Italian Phishing Scheme

18 Italians and 8 Eastern Europeans were arrested in a phishing scheme that targeted Poste Italiane's home-banking services and stolen identities from hundreds of unsuspecting users. Poste Italiane is Italy's government postal service which offers banking services. The group sent emails which directed unsuspecting users to a fake website that looked like Poste Italiane's site where information was then gathered.

A 22 y.o. admitted to being the main hacker who sent out emails and directed users to a cloned website overseas, appearing to be the Italian Postal Service where the information was then stolen and users bank accounts were emptied into cards the hackers had secured from Poste Italiane.

Police confiscated, laptops, data backup equipment, phones, false identification and equipment for manufacturing credit cards.

Dallas Computer Repair recommends avoiding identity theft by:

1. Never open emails from those you do not know
2. Never follow links from emails from senders you do not know
3. Always make sure you are on an authenticated secure site which should show a yellow address bar with the following prefix> https:
4. https: stands for hyper text transfer protocol secure

Botnets Targeting iPhone Buyers

A new botnet is making its way across the worldwide internet that so far has about 7,500 zombie computers on its network. Infected computers are directed to a malicious website that is designed to look like the iPhone website but is a fake and the botnet is able to deliver real looking popups and advertisents to users who attempt to go to iPhones authentic site. If users are on a secure webpage a yellow address background should be seen in the address bar.

Solution to Botnets:

1. Keep YOUR Computer Secure
2. Scan for Viruses regularly
3. Keep a Firewall running
4. Scan for Adware and Spyware

Storm Worm Morphed Again

Dallas Computer Repair is reporting that Strom Worm has again morphed and is showing up in emails prompting unsuspecting users to click on a link in an email where the participant is taken to a website and prompted to download malicious software.

Email users are urged not to open emails sent from unknown parties and to never click on a link to an unknown website much less download software from an unknown source.