New Trojan in the wild targeting MP3, WMA and WMV files

Stephen Withers
Monday, 14 July 2008 13:23

Your IT - Home IT

Researchers at Secure Computing say they've found a new Trojan in the wild that infects multimedia files including MP3s. It is thought to be seeded by 'warez' sites and then spread via peer-to-peer networks.

Apparently, the seed site downloads the Trojan to users that think they're getting a crack to allow the use of a copy-protected program.

When run, it infects every multimedia file on the computer, according to a Secure Computing spokesperson.

The sneaky part is that those files play normally on an infected computer. But if they are transferred to another system, whether directly or via a peer-to-peer network such as BitTorrent or Limewire, it's a different story.

The use is instead told by Windows Media Player that an additional codec is required to play the content. And guess what? The link isn't to a real codec, but a phoney that installs malware onto the computer.

The company recommends staying away from warez sites, and not downloading codecs purportedly needed to play multimedia content.