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Worm Attacks E-Mail

 

Mass-mailing worm exploits a vulnerability in the Web-based e-mail, but its

impact is low.

Jeremy Kirk, IDG News Service

Monday, June 12, 2006

A mass-mail worm that exploits a vulnerability in 's Web-based e-mail is

making the rounds but the impact appears to be low, security vendor Symantec

said today.

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The worm, which Symantec calls JS.Yamanner@m, is different from others in that

a user merely has to open the e-mail to cause it to run, said Kevin Hogan,

senior manager for Symantec Security Response. Mass-mail worms have usually been

contained in an attachment with an e-mail note encouraging a user to open it.

The worm, written in JavaScript, takes advantage of a vulnerability that

allows scripts embedded in HTML e-mail to run in the users' browsers.

users should be able to modify their settings to block the zero-day exploit,

Hogan said.

Symantec rated the worm a Level 2 threat, one notch above its least harmful

ranking. Hogan said the worm did not appear to be spreading widely, and he did

not anticipate the threat level rising.

 

How It Spreads

When activated, the worms then sends itself to other users in the victim's

address book who also use e-mail with the suffixes of @ or

@. The worm mimics a function within 's Web mail called

" Quickbuilder, " which allows a user to add contacts in an address book from

received e-mail, Hogan said. The process, however, is transparent to the victim,

he said.

The harvested e-mail addresses are sent to a remote server. Users of

Mail Beta do not appear to be affected, Symantec said.

The worm also opens a browser that displays a Web page that does not appear to

contain malicious content.

Although 's Web e-mail has not been fixed, users are advised to update

virus and firewall definitions and block any e-mail sent from av3. The

subject line of the e-mail with the worm says " New Graphic Site, " and the body

says " this is test. "

officials could not immediately be reached for comment.