Wackao » Security

What to do when VISTA crashes?

Sandy — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 06:05:37 +0000

There can be many ways of handling a VISTA crash.
VISTA Crash is actually an application crash that occurs due to various reasons.The causes of the crash can be programming errors, compatibility issues, background application error and other.

Follow the steps to handle crash and bring back your Windows back.

1. See if the application crashed has automatically terminated. If no terminate the application using task manager.Task Manager can be selected by pressing “Ctrl+alt+delete”.Select the application and “End Task”.

2. After the crashed application has terminated, do remember to save your work on any open applications.

3. Restart your PC/Laptop.

How to check and remove malware from your website

Sandy — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 07:00:30 +0000

Recently one my site was infected by a malware,i think the culprit was timthumb.php, my antivirus “Avira Free version” didn’t tracked this malware but this was tracked by one of my site visitor as his antivirus “AVG” showed the warning.

According to wikipedia “Malware is a malicious software, consists of programming (code, scripts, active content, and other software) designed to disrupt or deny operation, gather information that leads to loss of privacy or exploitation, gain unauthorized access to system resources, and other abusive behavior”.

I have spent hundred of hours working for my website…at first, i thought it’s all over for me…
But one of my trick did it and solved this malware problem.

If you have any of your website infected you can try this solution…i cannot guarantee it will work but it might work for you also as it did for me

1. Scan you website with this .

2. If this sitecheck shows any malware, note the source of the file infected.My problem was with one of the wordpress “wp-includes” file.

3. Then i compared the original wordpress file and this file and to my horror i found unlimited junk numbers.This was the malware which got my site infected.It was encrypted so my antivirus could not detect this.

4. I deleted this file from the wp-includes folder and replaced it with the new file by downloading a fresh wordpress and fetching the same file from it.

5. Checked my site again on the sitecheck and the malware was gone…..

Hope this solution also helps you…please share your views and let us know if any other solution.

Nasdag’s Communication Networks Hacked for more than a Year!

Ripul Kumar — Mon, 07 Feb 2011 04:19:48 +0000

This is strange but its true, Wall street Networks were hacked for over a year . According to readwriteweb.com, Nasdag’s communication networks were hacked for more than a year and the story was kept under the covers for quite a long time. The application on target of hackers was the Director’s desk which companies use to communicate with their directors, that means this application is one of most secure applications of th world as the information it transfer is of top secret level.

There are rumors that this might have been the act of Wikileaks as the purpose of hacking was not profit but information. Whatever be the reason, if one of the most secure networks in the world can be hacked then there is no reason to believe that we all are also vulnerable on the internet.

Iphone SMS vulnerability pack released.

Ripul Kumar — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 16:38:21 +0000

Apple today released its the very first update to the iPhone 3.0 software to address an SMS vulnerability that threatened the security of the iphone.

This is what apple said :”We appreciate the information provided to us about SMS vulnerabilities which affect several mobile phone platforms. This morning, less than 24 hours after a demonstration of this exploit, we’ve issued a free software update that eliminates the vulnerability from the iPhone.

Contrary to what’s been reported, no one has been able to take control of the iPhone to gain access to personal information using this exploit.”

So what are you waiting for, plug in your iphones and update it…!

How safe is your Apple Iphone 3GS ?

Ripul Kumar — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 16:49:49 +0000

Apple iphone 3GS security holes revealed in Youtube videos.
First video shows how an attacker can remove a password and can access your data on phone.

Second video shows how a hacker can use software tools to download a raw disk image from the phone that could provide personal information, deleted voice mails and other data.

[ratings]

Twitter being Attacked by Koobface

Ripul Kumar — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 17:46:35 +0000

Recent article on Wackao on how Twitter can be easily spammed and it seems like Twitter can easily be spammed by malware like the Koobface which recently infected thousands of users with a message like “My home video[URL]” and all these URL lead to Koobface website.

Official Twitter Status on Koobface

“Some users’ PCs have been infected with a variant of the Koobface malware. This malware sends bogus tweets when the user logs into Twitter.We are currently suspending all accounts that we detect sending such bogus tweets. If we suspend your account, we will send you an email notifying you of the suspension. This email also includes tips for removing the malware from your PC.”

“This is apparently the second attack given by Koobface in Twitter, the first one used only three different TinyURLs with infected users; this malware mutation gave the infection a longer life than the previous one, that also appeared on Facebook, MySpace, Bebo, Hi5, Friendster and LiveJournal.” [Source:Crenk]

Koobface is a worm and has a long history of infecting various social networking sites including myspace,hi5,bebo,friendster and facebook.

[ratings]

Removing New Folder.exe

Ripul Kumar — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 04:27:04 +0000

A very popular virus and has infected a lot of systems in the past though many antiviruses now have a cure for this virus incase u dont have an antivirus or a non-updated version of antivirus here are few steps of identifying this virus and removing it.
The following are the symptoms which show when a new folder.exe virus is residing in your system.
Your task Manger will be Disabled.Your Registry editor is disabled. Folder options will be missed from Tools in windows Explorer.Run command will be missed.It copies it self to all exe files and when the file is deleted new folder.exe files are created.so it occupies entire hard drive in terms of exe files and makes your system slow with this background process continuously running in the background.
Once you have found tthat the virus is new folder.exe,download use this New folde.exe virus remover to remove the virus.
[ratings]

MORRO:Microsoft’s free antivirus (first screenshots)

Ripul Kumar — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 12:50:07 +0000

Is this the new free Microsoft’s anti virus “Morro” ??

First screenshots revealed by windows blogger Neowin seem to think so.

Last november Microsoft announced the release of MORRO somewhere in late 2009.Gossip has been flying that the testing has already been done by the Microsoft engineers and the trial version will be soon available for free download.

As per microsoft MORRO will use fewer computing resources making it ideal for less powerful PC’s but will exclude other non security features such as printer sharing as available in other anti virus suites.

Morro first impression looks like windows defender.

Windows Live OneCare will continue to be sold for Windows XP and Windows Vista at retail through June 30, 2009, and would be phased out once Morro is made available.

[ratings]

Viruses Infecting via Autorun.inf !

Ripul Kumar — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 12:06:59 +0000

How many times has it happened that when you double click on your drive it asks you to choose a program which you can use to open it?
Some times it can be really frustrating, although there are a lot of viruses,worms and trojan’s which make use of this windows utility removing them can be a very easy task.
Autorun.inf is a file which automatically gets executed once the drive/folder gets loaded,

Select Program

it is similar to an autorun CD/DVD which automatically runs as soon as you insert it into the drive,there also we have an autorun.inf file which states which one is the next program to be executed.
Among the guidelines for being safe from Viruses and Trojans while surfing the internet is using a different user account which does not have administrator privileges to access the internet.This is because even after installing firewalls and antiviruses few of them manage to sneak though or worse some even corrupt your antivirus system.

Here’s the Solution to the above problem.
First thing is opening the autorun.inf file,simply type c:/autorun.inf or which ever drive shows that error you would see some instructions and a program name like “rejoice101.exe” or some other .exe file, just make a note of that file[That is Actually the Virus or Trojan].
Hold on! that is a readonly file so you cannot delete it .if you were following the guidelines of using a different account[non-admin privelage] you can log on as admin to delete the autorun.inf or try booting the windows in safe mode and then deleting the autorun.inf file.
If there is still some problem while deleting in safe mode try delteing the file from the command prompt.
i.e write cmd in start->run, and use cd c: to change to the respective drive and use del autorun.inf <-
If all these effort go to waste then you can try the deleting software “Exterminate It” and associate deleting of the autorun.inf file with restart of the windows,reboot and your file would be deleted.
If the file gets deleted you can use windows search utility to delete the virus .exe file[executable] and remove the registry entries from the windows registry.
For removing registry again go to start->run , type regedit <- then use the registry search system to locate the [virus name].exe file and delete the registry entries.
[ratings]