We love scary movies. We like psyching ourselves out from time to time by watching them. They’re not real anyways. Heck, we love movies in general. But there is one kind of movie that, scary or not, can affect us in real life. It’s the kind that will haunt us in our everyday activities, if we’re not too careful about choosing what to watch.
I’m not talking about those creepy videos, like in the movie “The Ring”. I’m talking about video files that are modified by WORM_REALOR.A. Yes, malware authors have now found a way to use video formats in spreading a “scare” to innocent movie fanatics.
Malware authors have always piggybacked on the popularity of videos in their attempt to spread their malicious codes. However, before, they just disguised their malware programs as video files to entice users to download the malware or to open email attachments that carry a copy of the malware.
Now, with the release into the wild of WORM_REALOR.A, malware authors use video files themselves to carry their malicious codes.
According to an article from Security Focus,
“…the increasing popularity of video downloads and streaming Internet video–as demonstrated by the $1.6 billion valuation that Google placed on Internet video startup YouTube–will likely mean that online attackers will increasingly find ways to utilize the digital media as a method of compromising PCs…”
Read more about this article here.
WORM_REALOR.A modifes Real Media (.RM and .RMVB) files by inserting a hyperlink, enabling it to load a Web page that contains a JavaScript. Detected as JS_DLOADER.HHZ, the JavaScript then accesses another Web site (not accessible as of this writing) and downloads a malicious file, quite possibly a copy of WORM_REALOR.A, completing a vicious infection cycle.
So when you download your favorite scary movies, or maybe the latest episodes of your favorite TV series for that matter, you might want to think twice and check the files before watching them. You might already be getting compromised in the process. Believe me, this is one kind of movie not worth freaking yourselves out with.