The Nimda worm was reported to have reached Asia yesterday. Users across the continent were beginning to feel the affects of the virus as it disrupted Internet access. Nimda, which is admin spelt backwards, was discovered earlier this week. The worm affects email users as well as the Internet.
Experts say the worm has now reached its peak and will begin to trail off. "Since late yesterday the number of infected web servers has come down" said Mr Hartmann of Trend Micro. Fortunately due to the publicity viruses receive in the media, the damage they cause is relatively contained. Mr Hartmann added, "A lot of users have upgraded and done what they need to do to take care of the problem". However Nimda has appeared to be a greater threat than most recent worms as it has multiple mechanisms to allow the worm to spread faster. The worm emails itself to users without a subject line and with an attachment titled "readme.exe".
Experts believe that this worm could cause more damage than Code Red back in July and August. The BBC reported that Code Red caused an estimated $2.6 billion in damage.
With the fear of stating the obvious, users are reminded to regularly update anti-virus software and never open mail from an unknown source.
