Worm dupes with fake Microsoft address
C|Net | at | by Mike
A new mass-mailing e-mail worm, which feigns a Microsoft.com origin, is spreading rapidly. Antivirus vendors say it can also spread via a local area network and can install spyware on a victim's PC. The Palyh, or Mankx, worm appears to come from support@microsoft.com, a forged address. It contains a file which, upon execution, self-propagates using e-mail addresses from files stored on the targeted system, but which can also spread to other Windows machines on a local area network (LAN). Although the file has a .pi or .pif extension, it is an .exe file. And because Windows processes files according to their internal structure than their extension, Windows runs the file as soon as the person double-clicks on it.