Sophos: Top 10 Viruses and Hoaxes in August 2002
This is the latest in a series of monthly charts counting down the ten most frequently occurring viruses and hoaxes as compiled by Sophos, a world leader in corporate anti-virus protection.
For August 2002, the virus chart is as follows, with the most frequently occurring virus at number one:
1. W32/Klez-H (Klez variant) 17.0%
2=. W32/Yaha-E (Yaha variant) 6.4%
2=. JS/NoClose (NoClose Trojan) 6.4% RE-ENTRY
4. W32/Badtrans-B (Badtrans variant) 5.3%
5. W32/ElKern-C (ElKern variant) 5.1%
6. W32/Higuy-A (Higuy) 2.7% NEW ENTRY
7. W32/Datom-A (Datom) 2.4% NEW ENTRY
8. W32/Magistr-B (Magistr variant) 2.1%
9. W32/Sircam-A (Sircam) 1.9%
10. W32/Nimda-D (Nimda variant) 1.6%
Others: 49.1%
“Only two viruses in August’s top ten are brand new entries. Instead, the chart is full of old stalwarts such as Klez-H, Badtrans-B, Sircam and Nimda,” said Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at Sophos Anti-Virus. “Klez-H and its nasty bedfellow ElKern-C, have accounted for almost a quarter of enquiries to Sophos’s support centre this month, even though protection has been available since February. Users getting caught out by them appear not to have updated their anti-virus software in six months. With hundreds of new viruses appearing each month, this lax approach is just asking for a security breach.”
More information on how Klez-H and ElKern-C work in tandem in an attempt to infect computer networks can be found at: http://www.sophos.com/virusinfo/analyses/w32klezh.html
The top ten hoaxes reported to Sophos during August 2002 are as follows:
1. JDBGMGR 14.0%
2. Budweiser frogs screensaver 6.9%
3. A virtual card for you 6.2%
4. Hotmail hoax 6.0%
5. Nigerian letter 5.9%
6. Bill Gates fortune 3.9%
7. Frog in a blender/Fish in a bowl 3.7%
8. JS/Exploit 2.7%
9. Meninas da Playboy 2.4%
10. Mobile phone hoax 2.3%
Others 45.8%
“Hoaxes continue to cause almost as much confusion as real viruses. The multi-lingual JDBGMGR hoax, which claimed to be an extremely dangerous virus, has been perplexing computer users ever since it first appeared in May,” continued Cluley. “Simple to implement anti-hoax policies can help limit this confusion and will prevent hoaxes from needlessly clogging up email servers and wasting valuable bandwidth.”
Sophos has made available a free, always-fresh, information feed for intranets and websites which means users can always find out about the latest viruses and hottest hoaxes: http://www.sophos.com/virusinfo/infofeed/
Graphics of the above Top Ten virus chart are available at: http://www.sophos.com/pressoffice/imgallery/topten
For more information about safe computing, including anti-hoax policies, please visit: http://www.sophos.com/safecomputing