The Inside Story of the Conficker Worm

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Osiris

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The Inside Story of the Conficker Worm

NewScientist has pieced together the history behind the most widespread virus in recent history, the Conficker worm. It's an interesting read so follow the jump if you like this sort of thing.


Despite an unprecedented collaboration against them, Conficker's accomplished creators have been able to bluff and dodge to gain control of machines inside homes, universities, government offices and the armed forces of at least three nations, establishing a powerful and lucrative network of "zombie" computers.
 
The article is interesting and leaves me with two questions:

They say now a 'zombie' army of millions infected computers exists to do the bidding of the conficker creators. But wouldn't that be impossible if normal antivirus software can find it and remove it? I would think the vast majority of computers are protected by some kind of anti virus software.

Also I get the impression that conficker can enter your computer by itself, with no action by the user.. I thought there was no way your computer could get infected without the user actively doing something, like going to an infected site or clicking on a popup.
 
Also I get the impression that conficker can enter your computer by itself, with no action by the user.. I thought there was no way your computer could get infected without the user actively doing something, like going to an infected site or clicking on a popup.

Of course it can :p But only on machines with no/bad security.
 
I can see in my log constant attempts to log into my computers, but I've always been told the firewalls will not let anything in unless specifically permitted by the user (click click).

Also they said that huge numbers of these zombie computers are in government and corporate networks. Well I'm assuming that most of these networks have security software and network people, and it sounds like they simply can't find the conficker worm in their zombie computers. Which doesn't sound right.
 
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