Virus 'President Milosevic's death'

Security experts are now warning about a new virus released through fake email messages about the death of President Slobodan Milosevic.

These e-mails often have the title "Slobodan Milosevic was killed" (President Slobodan Milosevic was assassinated). Users are encouraged to open a fake "photo" file that demonstrates the crime of assassinating Mr. Milosevic.

But if the user opens the attachment - usually a self-executing UPZ file, a trojan called a Dropper-FB will break into their computer. This is a trojan of "downloader" type.

As of this morning, online security firm BlackSpider estimates that more than 800,000 new trojan emails have been sent online before security companies can update their antivirus software.

The Dropper-FB trojan is a new demonstration that malware authors are increasingly taking advantage of social events to fulfill their dark goals.

Previously, the tsunami disaster in Asia in 2004 or the terrorist attacks in the UK in July 2005 was also taken advantage of by malware authors to spread viruses, worms and trojans.

Or other types of phishing malware that offer the death of international terrorist Osama bin Laden (Small-AXR Trojan) or Iraqi President Saddam Hussein (Bobax-H worm) has been constantly released in several months back here. Then even celebrities like Jennifer Lopez and Anna Kournikova joined the list.

James Kay, a senior technology expert with BlackSpider Technologies, said: "The author of the malware is hitting the psychological interest of the curious user to his advantage."

Hoang Dung