Posted on 10/23/2007 7:58:32 PM PDT by james500
A day after Adobe patched a serious security hole in its Reader and Acrobat programs, miscreants are flooding email inboxes with malware-tainted PDF files that try to remotely hijack vulnerable computers.
The malware, identified by Symantec researchers as Trojan.Pidief.A, is included in PDF files attached to a "fair number of emails," according to this blog entry. The spam typically targets specific businesses or organizations.
Adobe issued a patch for the vulnerability on Monday. The revelation of in-the-wild exploits underscores the importance of updating immediately. A patch for Reader is available here; an Acrobat update is available here.
Emails typically arrive bearing subjects such as "invoice," "statement" or "bill" and contain no text in the body. If the attached PDF is opened using a vulnerable version of Adobe software, the machine will execute code that lowers Windows security settings and installs a bevy of nasty malware, according to the SANS Internet Storm Center.
At least some of the spam comes courtesy of the Russian Business Network, a St. Petersburg-based service provider that offers bullet-proof hosting to criminals engaged in child pornography, identity theft and spam, according to Ken Dunham, director of global response at iSIGHT Partners. "The code and servers used in the attack are nearly identical to September 2006 Vector Markup Language (VML) zero-day attacks that took place one year ago," he wrote in an email.
READER update
http://www.adobe.com/support/downloads/detail.jsp?ftpID=3806
ACROBAT update
http://www.adobe.com/support/downloads/product.jsp?product=1&platform=Windows
As usual, this malware does not attack Macs.
I use Foxit for PDF files. I wonder if it is vulnerable as well.
ping!
ping
bump for work
This is for XP...NOT VISTA
So do I.
I would tend to doubt that Foxit is vulnerable. It is merely an executable and does not install to the registry as does Adobe. But I could be wrong. The payload may not care what opens it.
Why would anyone open any file from an unknown source?
Now, I know next to nothing about the OS security structure/model of the Windows OS(s), but why is this considered a flaw in Adobe, and not Windows?
Well, there is that...yes.
But if your cat happened to jump on the mouse at just the right angle when the email message is open....it could happen.
“Hello, I sendo this invoice to you for your review”
ping
I see. So the "malware" only attacks the computers of stupid people.
Oh c’mon— thats an extremely tired response as to why Apple has no viruses.....
You seen the latest earning reports over at Apple? You might want to rethink that not developing for Apple thing...
- also- if we have 10% market share, why not at least one virus in the wild? Not even asking for 10% ( Our fair share) of the viruses....
In any case, I’m certain writing for windows is a pretty good career path, what with all the productivity gains / anti-virus and anti spyware/adware assistance needed on that platform....
Lessee, MS has 90% of the marketplace for applications written for windows. They have 25% of the marketplace for Mac. Given that software support costs for Mac have traditionally far less than that for windows, I would say that the software you write is either not wanted by Mac users or you are missing an opportunity which MS isn’t.
Personally, I have little use for MS, but I have never denied that they have a certain brilliance marketing-wise. They don’t ignore the Mac market. And it is not a lost leader for them, either.
Think about it.
Not much fun hacking around with stuff that won’t aggravate the “establishment” computer users up there in the corporate world. Why would the goofy little script-kiddies modify a virus that’s more likely to bust a highschool boyfriend’s fruit machine than to make it into the news?
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