worm

Microsoft will unveil changes in next week's public Windows 7 Release Candidate that are designed to stymie the Conficker worm. But the company has not set a timeline for updating Windows XP and Vista.

A worm that tries to tap into celebrities' popularity on Twitter is rapidly spreading across the service, Sophos said on Friday.

Another worm attack early Monday on Twitter kept the micro-blogging Web service chasing down infected accounts and deleting rogue tweets.

Twitter was hit with at least three different worm attacks that started Saturday and continued into Sunday.

The Conficker worm is back in action and stumping security experts once again. One of the most craftily designed pieces of malware recently got an update and is finally starting to behave like other worms. Here's what's going on:

An old, but little-known worm has copied some of the infection strategies of Conficker, the worm that raised a ruckus last week, Microsoft security researchers said late Friday.

The Conficker worm has infected 500,000 of OpenDNS's more than 10 million users, making it more widespread than thought, the company said.

The Conficker Worm is like the Paris Hilton of computer security: Famous solely for being famous. Neither has actually ever done anything of note. But, at least Paris has a sense of humor about her celebrity. Conficker just wastes people's time.

No one knows exactly what Conficker will bring, but plenty of theories are floating around. Some take on apocalyptic tones, while others seem more like nonchalant groans. Before you unplug your computer and brace yourself in the fetal position, though, consider some of the possibilities and how likely they appear to be.

Conficker.c may be in headlines around the world, but most of the infected PCs are in Asia and Europe, with fewer than 6% of the total found in North America.