Security Response

Upwards of 20,000 stolen archives have been uploaded to a third party file-sharing site from hosts infected with a new threat called Infostealer.Offsupload. The following heatmap indicates the U.S. is the primary target of infection, however, only a few countries worldwide have managed to avoid the affect of this threat.

Infostealer.Offsupload is being used as part of a blended threat. The initial stage of the attack is an email purporting to come from FedEx with a malicious attachment: “FedEx_Invoice.exe”.

Once executed, this Trojan (detected as Trojan.Gen.2) contacts a command-and-control (C&C) server in order to...

Thanks to Anand Muralidharan for their assistance with this research.

Televison channels across the world are set to be at the 14th International Exhibition and Forum, World Content Show, held Feb 7- 9, 2012, in Russia. The exhibition showcases the latest technologies and trends in the TV and telecommunication industry.

This techno-fair will be attended in large numbers by leading media businesses, and spammers don’t want to miss the opportunity to circulate spam around the event. In a bid to catch the reader’s attention, one such spam email reveals some appealing facts about the event, such as Interactive Elements, Prize Drawings, Performance of Popular Leader/Star, and Colorful Musical Concerts.

Here is an example of this Russian spam observed by Symantec:

Here are the subject...

At 3 AM, on February 6, 2012, Symantec Security Response observed spam carrying malicious links which target the upcoming tax season. The spam volume spiked between 6 AM and 1 PM, identifying over 200 unique URLs which lead to a Blackhole toolkit.

A Blackhole toolkit compromises the machine by targeting various vulnerabilities on the victim's machine. Symantec protects our customers with multiple-layer protection of antispam, antivirus, and IPS signatures. The payload downloaded from the malicious website is detected as Trojan.Zbot, for instance, and IPS detects this web attack as “Web Attack: Blackhole Toolkit Website 14” and “...

You may not need pills to watch the super bowl but spammers feel that this definitely  is an occasion to do so! The most exciting annual championship of the NFL -  the Super Bowl XLVI - starts tomorrow. And as expected, spammers are playing a different ball game with the crazy Super Bowl fans.

Spam related to Super Bowl  can be spotted with the subject listed below:

Subject: Super Bowl [BRAND NAME] Sale
Subject: Super Bowl Special
Subject: Super Bowl
Subject: Super Bowl 2012 - You win no matter which team does!

One such spam sample that we discovered promotes an online pharmacy. The email offers a free generic combo pack after placing medical orders with them.

The link in the spam sample goes to the following online pharmacy site:

Another...