Eric Chien's blog

I wrote Symantec's original blog post describing the discovery of Duqu.

For years now, we in the cyber security industry have been saying an explosion of mobile malware is just around the corner. Beginning in earnest this year, we have indeed observed a marked increase in threats targeting mobile devices – particularly the Android platform. However, it’s probably not accurate to say the expected explosion has in fact occurred.

Thanks to some tips from a Dutch Profibus expert who responded to our call for help, we’ve connected a critical piece of the puzzle.

Since we still haven’t had much success in determining the likely target of Stuxnet, we have decided to release at a high level the behavior of the PLC code. However, we suspect this level of detail while interesting probably still is not enough to identify the potential target.  You can find the additional information starting on page 38 of the latest revision of our paper.

We’re pleased to announce that we’ve compiled the results of many weeks of fast-paced analysis of Stuxnet into a white paper entitled the W32.Stuxnet Dossier.

Zeus is a botnet package that allows for the easy creation and command and control of a botnet.  We've discussed Zeus previously in Zeus, King of the Underground Crimeware Toolkits.

A Blackberry application called PhoneSnoop was released recently, which resulted in an advisory from US-CERT. The application allows remote users to listen in on a Blackberry user’s surroundings.   
 

SMS phishing (“SMSishing”) occurs when you receive an SMS message that is purportedly sent from a reputable source, such as your bank, asking for personal details. Although SMSishing first started a few years ago, a couple of recent SMSishing attempts directed at some colleagues of mine provided a good opportunity to document the attack.

As the April 1 payload delivery date nears for W32.Downadup.C (also known as Conficker) speculation continues on whether the payload will be one big April Fool’s joke, or the equivalent of a cyber Pearl Harbor.

Editor’s Note: This is the seventh installment of a multi-part series on specific and interesting aspects of W32.Downadup.