Internet Worm Poses As Gates Message

The worm, a variant of the Sobig worm called Sobig-C, was discovered Saturday and spreads via e-mail and network shares, according to Network Associates. It contains its own SMTP engine for creating outgoing messages and e-mails itself to addresses on the victim's system.

Sobig-C arrives as an e-mail that poses as a message from [email protected] or from addresses it finds on the victim's hard drives, according to Sophos. The infected e-mail may have subject lines such as "Re: Movie" or "Re: Approved" and a variety of attachments such as screensavers (.scr).

Network Associates upgraded Sobig-C's threat to medium from low on Sunday. Symantec gave the worm a risk rating of 3 on a scale of 1 to 5 with 5 being the most serious.