Conflicker C April Fools Day Worm or Trojan

Most of you have heard about the Conflicker C virus that is expected to be released on April Fools Day. This gets me to wonder is this a deadly virus that will actually destroy our computers or is this an April Fools Day joke? The problem is that we do not really know and therefore are we prepared to take the chance that Conflicker C is just a joke?

What is Conflicker C?

Conflicker C is a worm (Trojan) that first surfaced in October 2008. It is also known as Kido, downup and downadup. Conflicker C specifically targets the Microsoft operating system. Conflicker C looks for vulnerability in the window server for Windows, 2000, Windows 2003, Windows Server 2003, Windows 7, Windows XP, Windows Server 2008 Beta, Windows Server 2008 R2 Beta, and Windows Vista. The worm is set to go off on April Fools Day and it is believed to be powerful force. It also protects itself by blocking your access to anti virus protection websites.

What will Conflicker C do to a computer?

The worm will find the vulnerability in these systems and spreads through the infected computer by carrying out an embedded code that will pass through one computer to another (RPC request). The group of infected computers is called a botnet, and once the creators of Conflicker C have the botnet in place, Conflicker C will cause havac to all of them.

The Conflicker C worm will then disable or shutdown different Microsoft operations such as Windows Automatic Update, Windows Security Center, Windows defender and Windows Error Reporting. Conflicker C can also attach itself to sychost.exe, explorer.exe and services exe. Conflicker C will connect to a server and can upload information from your computer and install various malware files.

It will launch attacks on various websites and send out though unsolicited emails we all have received at one time or another.

It will reverse computer reset points
Prevent restart in save mode
Allow access for worms through shareware
Slow your system down
Disable various functions on your computer
Disallow access to security and antivirus websites

How much damage has been caused so far?

The Conflicker C virus has already infected a million computers and can reach up to the estimate of 9 to 15 millions computers before it runs its course. The experts say it is the worst virus since SQL Slammer.

Thirty percent of computers do not have the windows patch that was released in 2006 that prevent the infiltration of this worm virus.

The virus is not just a threat to home computers government departments are infected too. The U.K. Ministry of defense reported having infected desk tops computers in their administration buildings and aboard the navy warships while 800 computers in the city of Sheffield are said to be infected as well.

By February 1, 2009, the schools in Rochester England were said to be infected. The Conflicker C virus continued to spread and infiltrated the British House of Commons.

What further damage is expected from Conflicker C?

According to Snopes, on April 1, each infected computer in the botnet will call home and ask for conflicker C instructions. Some people speculate that a big catastrophe will occur, with millions of computers down and the Internet disabled similar to the predictions of the infamous Y2K. The fact is nobody really knows what will happen, we have to watch and find out.

Dean Turner of Symantec Security says he doubts there will be substantial cyber disaster. More than likely the internet will not go down, the makers of Conflicker C are profit driven and need the computers in the botnet to make money for them by sending out spam emails and so on. Paul Ferguson of researcher for Trend Micro, concurs. He says these people, "don't want to bring down the infrastructure. That would not allow them to continue to carry out their scams."

What is being done about Conflicker C?

According to Wikipedia Microsoft is offering a $250,000 reward for any information leading to the conviction of the creators of Conflicker C.

How to repair the damage done by Conflicker C

There is a repair patch that will that can be found at Microsoft, BitDefender, Eset, Symantec, MaAfee, and AVG. However for people with computers that are using older models Windows XP service pack 1 or earlier, you are out of luck there is no patch because your support period from Microsoft has expired.

Conclusion:

This appears to be very real not one of those virus hoaxes going around. Cnn News and ever our local Montreal CTV news has reported it as well. It is confirmed true by www.snopes.com

Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conficker
http://www.insidetech.com/news_feeds/visit?uri=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.maximumpc.com%2Farticle%2Fnews%2Fthis_no_joke_confickerc_strike_april_fools_day
http://www.snopes.com/computer/virus/conficker.asp