Breaking News! New Worm-rbot.cbq Brings Windows 2000 Computers Crashing to a Screeching Halt Across the U.S. (Zotob - not “Zobot” - Also Implicated)   8/16/2005 - 1,437 views, 1 Comment

Summary: Worm-rbot.cbq, rbot.ebq, Win.32.rbot.ebq, Zotob, Botzor.exe, or Zobot - whatever you call it, and whichever it is, it's causing a whole lot of trouble across the United States.

Previous Article « Internet Exacerbates Illegal Trade in Rare and Endangered Species
Read Next Article » Microsoft Statement Regarding Zotob Worm that Crashed CNN, ABC, NYT and Congress: “Low Threat for Customers”

A brand new worm being called worm-rbot.cbq, or rbot.ebq, possibly related to Win.32.rbot.ebq, may be what brought Win2k computers across the United States to a screeching halt. Many however believe it is the Zotob worm, also known as Botzor.exe (but not Zobot!), ramping up over the past few days, which is responsible for the mass crashing. According to CNN, it is worm-rbot.ebq, but many others are confirming Zotob sightings. Whatever it is, it’s wreaking havoc.

While some Windows XP systems are being affected, the worm is primarily crashing Windows 2000 computers.

Symptoms include repeated shutting down and rebooting.

According to CNN, its own computers in its New York and Atlanta offices started crashing about about 5:00pm Eastern time. ABC news reports that its computers were hit at about 1:30pm Eastern time.

Said Lysa Myers of security company McAfee, “How it’s spreading is it’s looking for machines that are unpatched and running itself.” Johannes Ullrich of the Sans Institute explained “It scans network neighborhoods and tries to infect them, as well.”

In Peoria, Illinois, there are reports that the worm took down the Caterpiller company, and Aunty has heard back-channel stories of companies with thousands of employees having to shut down as the worm got the better of their computer systems.
The worms are thought to be spreading primarily through infected laptops connecting to unsecure networks.

If it is Zotob, and for that matter even if it’s not, if you haven’t already, you should install the Microsoft patch for Zotob now!

Get FREE email alerts of new Internet Patrol stories!
    *We never share your email address with anyone

Email Address:
Date of first visit:
How you found us:

Subscribe
to The Internet Patrol on your cell phone    Email the link for this page to a friend!

Read more:

»  Zotob Botzor.exe Worm Removal Tool Offered by Microsoft

»  Microsoft Statement Regarding Zotob Worm that Crashed CNN, ABC, NYT and Congress: “Low Threat for Customers”

»  Sasser Suspect Sven Speaks (and Confesses)

»  Windows Worm of the Day Zotob Attacks Plug and Play (a/k/a Botzor.exe, but not “Zobot”)

For additional similar stories check out our archives on Virus & AntiVirus, Windows, Worms

 

1 Comment »

  1. Heh. They laughed when they saw the machine tool system I installed at Cat Peoria used OS/2.

    Comment by Fred — 8/16/2005 @ 6:25 pm

RSS feed for comments on this post.

Leave a comment

Warning! All comments which contain URLs and are clearly just spam to generate a link back to the URL will be deleted on sight. Don't bother wasting your time!

If you are going to include a URL in your comment,
please keep it under 25 characters in length,
or use TinyURL to shorten it before including it in your comment.

Line and paragraph breaks are automatic, your email address is never displayed.
HTML allowed: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>

(required)

(required)


We apologize for having to ask you to enter the letters and numbers you see in the image above to validate your comment, but we are being attacked by thousands of comment form spams every day!

 
The Internet Patrol
Patrolling the Internet for You!