Businesses should brace themselves for a further spread
of the Kama Sutra worm next Friday (3 February), as the worm is
programmed to try and replicate itself from already-infected
machines.
The worm, also given the name Nyxem.E by security software
suppliers, will at the same time attempt to delete certain files on
infected machines – it has been programmed to do this on the third
day of every month.
It is estimated that the worm, which is spread by users opening
an attachment promising porn images, has already infected around
500,000 machines worldwide.
The worm first appeared on 16 January and almost immediately
went to the top of the virus and worm threat charts compiled by
security software suppliers.
The programmed date for further attacks is similar to the
technique used by the latest version of the Sober worm, which has
appeared in recent weeks.
That worm was programmed to replicate on the date of the
formation of the German Nazi party, and is believed to have
originated in Germany.
All major security software suppliers have already issued
patches for Kama Sutra. But they say that even those companies that
already have installed protection against the worm could be
affected by slower e-mail response rates next week as networks fend
off the worm’s replication attempts.