Users wary of Paris Hilton worm

Despite utilising the celebrity status of Paris Hilton, the Sober-K worm doesn't appear to be tricking Australians so far.

Paul Ducklin, head of technology for Asia Pacific at anti-virus vendor Sophos, said that the company had not yet seen any infections in Australia.

The Sober-K worm tries to lure people by using a number of different subject lines with the words 'Paris Hilton' in them. It also tries to appeal to different people, for example by sending itself in either German or English, Ducklin said.

Allan Bell, marketing director for Asia Pacific at McAfee, told iTnews that the reports it had seen had mostly come from Europe, with Germany and the Netherlands featuring particularly highly.

"At the moment we're not seeing a lot of samples for it, so it's primarily of interest because of the topic."

Bell said virus writers used social engineering to try and persuade people to open the attachments. "It also shows how the virus writers are jumping on the latest news so they can get more people to open it [the attachments]."

Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at Sophos, warned that users should be reminded to follow safe computing guidelines, with PCs automatically updated with the latest anti-virus protection.

"Although much-publicised virus outbreaks in the past should have made users more nervous of double-clicking on unsolicited email attachments, some still find it hard to resist," Cluley said.