Sidebar: Win 2k Bugs Called 'Routine'

Computerworld - Despite the media frenzy, none of last week's slew of worms targeting a Windows 2000 vulnerability was all that unusual or serious, security experts said.
"We would not characterize this as a widespread problem. The worms were similar in nature to worms we routinely see on the Internet," said Debbie Fry Wilson, director of Microsoft's Security Response Center.
"There was nothing unusual about the exploit code or the type of worms created," she said. "The difference here was that you had an unusual number of media outlets that were impacted," resulting in a lot of publicity. The bug hit outlets such as CNN, The New York Times and ABC News.
Similar worms are spread "all the time," noted Ero Carrera, a virus researcher at F-Secure Corp. in Helsinki, Finland. "There was no major new trend or techniques that made these worms particularly virulent."
No estimates were available late last week on the extent of the damage caused by the worms, though most antivirus vendors assessed the worms as medium- to low-risk threats.
Trend Micro Inc. rated two of 10 of the worms as a medium risk, while the rest garnered a low-risk rating. Rival antivirus vendor McAfee Inc. pegged only one of 10 on its list as medium risk, with the rest said to be low risk.
Even so, it would be a mistake to underestimate all the worms, warned an advisory from security vendor Arbor Networks Inc. in Lexington, Mass.
"Arbor Networks has received calls from a number of large companies that have been devastated by Zotob," one of last week's Windows 2000 worms, the advisory said. The appearance of several Zotob variants, including one that spreads via e-mail, could portend problems for companies, Arbor warned.

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