Is conflicker an april fool or is it a real virus?

Wikipedia has an in-depth article about Conficker so I’m going to go with the view that it is a real computer worm and it looks to be a very nasty one also.

See this similar question: http://www.fluther.com/disc/40126/are-you-worried-about-the-conficker-virus/

If you can link to this microsoft site microsoft conflicker you are probably ok. Coflicker inhibits connection to sites with defender, microsoft, symantec, norton, mcafee, and others in the address.

Anyone besides me think death by stoning with damaged pcs is an appropriate punishment for these smart SOBs?

Viruses are rarely, if ever, jokes. This one is serious.

pretty sure its real, be careful!

There are a lot of fake virus warnings floating about all look REAL but turn out to be crap .
I am not worries about it , i never worry about such things.

i am not worries about it either, i have a mac. ;)

but seriously, no, it’s not a joke, it’s actually kind of a nightmare for sys. admins around the world, and the worst thing is that we don’t really know what it’ll do…

This one’s been around for a while. It’s not fake.

Here’s what you can do.

Its been around a for a while. From what I understand, its pretty much been a dormant virus that only spreads. Apparently it was reported that the virus will trigger something in a variety of systems today. No one knows what has been infected by the virus, if anything at all. Right now many believe the virus is responsible for the Defense system in France triggering. I don’t know a link to the incident sadly, but if I find one I will post it.

The reason many people think its a prank is because they feel like the hackers are trying to spread mass hysteria without the means to back it up. Remember the ruckus over the bird flu? Yeah, they’re trying for another panic like that.

Conficker is real. And it’s a worm that’s infected an arguably large number of PCs.

Today, like it has several times in the past, it’s actively changing its technique for phoning home to get new instructions.

In and of itself, since it’s done this before, there’s nothing all that special about April 1.

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But here’s the rub: a Conficker-compromised machine is under the control of the Conficker puppet masters. At any time, they could release a command to cause your PC to do whatever they want:

- download kiddie porn
– coordinate a DDoS attack on any number of legitimate sites
– keylog the user’s activity (like SSN, credit card numbers, passwords) and send it out
– use grid computing techniques to find a cure for cancer

There’s no telling what it can do. At the very least, it’s stealing cycles to keep itself alive. It’s insidious and should be removed as soon as possible.

And Microsoft oughtta get off their collective asses and fix their stupid, backwards, upside down OS for real. And certainly not try to sell you additional products to keep you “safe” that actually do no such thing.

Microsoft are money grabbing cnuts tho they want all your money , if they see a profit they will exploit it shame its to the expense of keeping your information and computer safe .

Wow, @sandystrachan. While I do think that Microsoft aren’t the best, it’s worthwhile to realize that without them, computing would not be where it is today. Plus, there’s no direct way Microsoft would benefit from being exploited in such a huge manner like with Conficker – if anything it costs them lots of money to pay developers to create patches.

There’s no reason you need to buy Microsoft products nowadays. There are plenty of alternatives, both in terms of programs and alternative operating systems. There are also techniques for using Windows in a way that keeps you save, such as via virtual machines, Parallels, or Wine for Linux.

MS isn’t responsible for keeping you safe, that’s 100% your job as the producer of the data. And even if they DID have a guarantee, I would not care nor feel secure in it. I always rely on myself to back up data. Of course, they try to sell products like the one @robmandu links to, but anyone who knows beans about computers knows that such a program is worthless.

If one wants to truly keep their computer safe, they don’t use Windows, for one thing :)

Removed by me

hahahahaha APRIL FOOLS, ALL OF YOU!

Update.