Norway is hardly knownas a source of deadly viruses, but last week it spawned mining malware which isinfecting a growing number of computers across the globe.
The Norwegian Center forInformation Security (NorSiS) explained that the virus is being transmitted viaFacebook as a private message, recognizable by its form of message text “lol”and an attached file Pic_00783.zip.
Scale?
Clicking on the filebegins a process for mining Bitcoin and other crypto-currencies, causingsignificant burdening of the computer’s processor and slowing the machine downconsiderably. “The computer gets infectedas soon as you download the image and open the attachment,” senior advisorVidar Sandland confirmed to VG.
The virus was firstdiscovered by Norwegian telecommunications company Telenor. It is as yetunclear how prevalent it has become internationally, although the spread is “significant,” according to Sandland.
He added, however,that the virus was primarily a Norwegian phenomenon due to the highinfiltration of Java. However, it does not affect mobile platforms and onlyWindows computers are susceptible.
Nevertheless, “nothing prevents malware from mutating todo other things,” he cautioned, adding “Rightnow there is not any antivirus software that detects and removes the virus andit is worrying, although we expect that more suppliers will gradually becomeable to detect and remove the virus.”
In the meantime,NorSiS recommends updating antivirus software and, of course, not to downloadthe message, which has been received by some Norwegian users up to six times inthe past week.