Worm wishes you unhappy new year

A raft of emails with attachments containing malware are indundating internet users' inboxes worldwide, according to security experts.

The attachments, postcard.zip or postcard.exe, come with emails with a subject line that reads 'Happy New Year'. However, the senders' greetings are far from benevolent - if the attachment is opened, a worm infects the PC and attempts to send itself to email addresses in the unfortunate recipient's contact list.

Experts at Verisign's iDefense Labs believe the worm is a varient of the Warezov Trojan, a piece of malware first discovered last year and that has become one of the most prolific worms on the internet.

Email users are advised not to open any attachments that come from untrusted sources and to be particularly wary of attachments with a .exe or .zip extension.

Security company Sophos also offered advice to internet users.

"Everyone should be suspicious of unsolicited email attachments, and ensure that their PC defenses - including their anti-virus protection - are in place and up-to-date," said Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant for Sophos.

http://labs.idefense.com/
http://www.sophos.com/

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