Yes it is April Fools Day and the worm is now live.
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It is April Fools Day and yes Conficker is now live. What will the days out come be? Will it infect millions or will it send out its zombie robots? To date and time nothing has been reported as happened, but the days unfolding will tell the tale.
My recommendations would be to turn off your automatic updates. Don’t download or install anything! Even email is suspected to be hit with things like, “see yourself on video”, from Auntie May. This is an example and what I am trying to say is even email from people you know this nasty little worm can transform into something you just don’t want to catch. Be very cautious of anything you click on. It is also very wise to make a back up of your system so if you do get infected you will have all your data saved some place else.
Not turning on your computer today will also not work. It will only prolong the effects and when you do turn your PC back on it will continue from there. Changing the date on your computer also will not have any effect.
Microsoft is offering a Free Scan but it has been reported that some people have trouble with this crashing their systems so beware of this also. Others said they had no problem at all. I guess it is a 50/50 type of thing. Coficker may also prevent you from accessing any tools that are being offered out their.
I guess we will all have to wait and see how bad this will be. Will we all survive the malware critter that is among us today? Will we have remnants of this nasty thing for years to come, or will tomorrow come without any affects on us at all? I hope we all do manage some how to escape the clutches of this thing and tomorrow will come with all being quiet once more. Or at least until the next, “warning worm alert”!
April 2nd, 2009 at 7:51 am
Thanks for sharing this.
April 2nd, 2009 at 8:09 am
It sounds quite scary, but I’ve had no effects so far. Thanks for the warning.
Christine
April 2nd, 2009 at 8:10 am
Thanks for the advice/warning. Really informative. What I can never understand about these bugs/virus’—who does them and why?
April 2nd, 2009 at 9:31 am
Excellent! That was interesting and informative too. I loved it! Keep it up. Well done and thanx for sharing
April 2nd, 2009 at 10:07 am
Excellent article. Aparently this virus is very clever and will burrow deep into your computer, gathering information and awaiting instruction: very dangerous!
April 2nd, 2009 at 10:15 am
Informative, thanks
April 2nd, 2009 at 10:56 am
Turning off automatic updates probably won’t matter, as many large corporations have caught on to evicting the bug form their servers. In the realm of scanning, not only does Microsoft offer a free scan tool but so does Symantec and Trend Micro (so name a couple) and they work fairly well, just take a little time.
As for backing up your data, it never hurts and you should back up your data regularly anyway. If you are extremely worried, back up your data and then disconnect your backup device from your computer (to separate it in the event something does go awry).
Bear in mind, most likely the virus will most likely be used to send spam e-mail or allow in malware which would make a profit for the author(s) of this well made bot. The odds of them simply causing havoc for the sake of causing havoc and taking down the internet is highly unlikely as they don’t stand to make any money that way.
April 2nd, 2009 at 4:22 pm
Thank you for the advice.
April 2nd, 2009 at 4:40 pm
Good article as always hun, ive not experienced anything to date but am still keeping an eye out just in case xx
April 2nd, 2009 at 7:15 pm
Thank you for the update.
April 2nd, 2009 at 8:05 pm
ok,thanks much
April 2nd, 2009 at 9:02 pm
Good advice, thanks for keeping us up to date on this!
April 2nd, 2009 at 10:59 pm
thx for the update. havent seen nothing, but i am still being very cautious.
April 3rd, 2009 at 12:44 am
thanks for the reminder, Linda.
April 3rd, 2009 at 1:38 am
I think it’s an April fool hoax. My computer has been on all the time, without anti virus (don’t use any, just Windows Firewall and Firefox browser) it’s now 2:30 AM April 3 and no ill effects. Save yourself a lot of worry.
April 3rd, 2009 at 7:46 am
great info
April 3rd, 2009 at 2:38 pm
Great advice. Thanks!
April 6th, 2009 at 6:56 am
thanks for that… we haven’t april fools day in my country
April 7th, 2009 at 11:19 pm
Yikes, I knew not of this… but I guess since the 1st is about one week past, the threat (real or not) is gone?
April 9th, 2009 at 12:12 am
thanks to you i got a head start and knew what they was talking about….thank-you lu lu!
April 11th, 2009 at 10:36 am
Almost time people, we are almost set to launch.
See you all in hell.
July 28th, 2009 at 9:25 pm
lol… neverhappened