Malicious Trojan Pretends To Be Good

Symantec Corp. is warning PC users about a new Trojan horse that terminates adware on a person's computer, but also deletes files and tries to download code from remote Web sites.

Downloader.Lunii affects computers running Windows 2000, 95, 98, Me, NT and XP, the Cupertino, Calif.-based, security vendor said. The malware was discovered this week and is rated as a low risk.

Trojan horses, often referred to as spyware, run in the background unbeknownst to the PC user. The malicious code often uses infected machines to send spam or launch denial-of-service attacks.

Adware, also called spyware, typically displays targeted ads based on words searched for on the Web or derived from the PC user's surfing habits that have been periodically sent in the background to a spyware's Web server.

This story courtesy of TechWeb News