Yet another worm has graced our computers with it’s presence but this one can also affect the Internet too.

Cleverly named ‘Nimda’, which is admin backwards, this worm is thought to be a serious worry to the IT world. Similar to other worms in the way it infects your PC; this can be spread by e-mail attachments as well as through inside networks and HTTP. The subject on the e-mails sent usually says “Readme.exe” or “Readme.eml” however this worm is particularly virulent as it can infect the PC without the e-mail even being opened!

Once it has infected the PC, it scans for possible ways into the system so it can be further spread. Certain systems – firewalls for example – will protect the PC user from some parts of the worm, but due to the three ways in which it can transmit it would appear that Nimda is more difficult to stop.

Roger Thompson, an expert in such matters, compared this worm to others, such as the Code Red, and found it to be “….much faster, much more aggressive and much bigger….” The worm had spread worldwide within half an hour of its discovery.