Experts Fear New Code Red Virus Battle
W A S H I N G T O N, July 30 -- The "Code Red" computer worm,which infected 300,000 computers and disrupted several U.S.government Web sites last week, could soon wreak more havoc on theInternet, government and high-tech officials warned Sunday.
The computer worm, which first surfaced July 19, is set tore-emerge Tuesday evening in a possibly more powerful form,according to an advisory released by Microsoft Corp., the FBI'sNational Infrastructure Protection Center, and several othergroups. The groups planned to discuss Code Red at a press conference today.
300,000 Servers Infected
Code Red, named by computer programmers for a favorite softdrink, lodges itself on server computers that then areinstructed to blitz government Web sites with data. Some of theinfected Web sites display the message "Hacked by Chinese!" While the White House Web site managed to avoid disruptionon July 19, the Pentagon cut off public access to most of itsWeb sites on July 23 to guard against the worm. Officials anticipated that Code Red, which has infected atleast 300,000 computer servers, could slow down Web trafficsubstantially when it re-emerges on Tuesday at 8 P.M. Eastern time, the advisory said.
Vulnerable: Windows NT, 2000 & Microsoft's Internet Information Server
Computers running Microsoft Windows NT or Windows 2000systems and Microsoft's Internet Information Server softwareversion 4.0 or 5.0 are vulnerable to infection, the advisorysaid. In order to limit the worm's impact, the advisoryrecommended that vulnerable users visithttp://www.digitalisland.net/codered/ for instructions on howto download a software patch.
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