Spam mail from news sites spread malware

BY PAWAN BALI

New Delhi

Aug. 15: Beware of emails pegged as being sent from international news portals such as MSNBC and CNN. India’s Computer Emergen-cy Response Team (CERT-In) has warned that a dangerous malware is being spread in the country through email with the name of MSNBC.com "Breaking News".

This new malware comes on the heels of another CNN.com identified last week.

Malware (derived from malicious software) is a software designed to infiltrate or damage a computer system without the owner’s informed consent. Malware includes computer viruses, worms, trojans and also spyware, programming that gathers information about a computer user without permission.

CERT-In said it has been observed that a new wave of spam e-mails pretending to be from MSNBC.com is circulating widely. These e-mails come with the subject line of current affairs, such as MSNBC.com Breaking News: Stock set to fall in recession" or Breaking News: Elizabeth Taylor found murdered at home.

When the unsuspecting user clicks on the link in the email to read the news, he is redirected to a malicious webpage which then attem-pts to infect the computer with a trojan horse and/or worms.

To make people believe that it has come from authentic MSNBC website, the email tells the users, he received the email because he subscribed to the newsletter or someone forwarded the newsletter. It even provides a fake link to un-subscribe the newsletter.

CERT-In has advised the people to view such emails in plain text format. Exercise caution while clicking on any link embedded inside an e-mail message. CERT-In has also advised the users to install updated anti virus software at gateway and desktop level, besides anti-spyware software at desktop level. Last week CERT-In has warned the users against another malware which that was projecting itself as being sent by CNN. Both MSNBC and CNN malware is suspected to be sent from the same source.