The creative subjects of botnet blasted e-mails

by Steve Ragan - Jul 31 2008, 21:19

The FBI has recently issued another warning about the Storm Worm, advising everyone to avoid the creative e-mails and subject lines that are luring people towards malicious content. The content, in every case, is actually adding victim computers to the botnet, then in turn the captured computers send yet more creative malicious e-mails.

"The spammers spreading this virus are preying on Internet users and making their computers an unwitting part of criminal botnet activity," said Special Agent Richard Kolko, chief of the FBI National Press Office. "We urge citizens to help prevent the spread of botnets by becoming web-savvy. Following some simple computer security practices will reduce the risk that their computers will be compromised."

The FBI and the Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) issued the warning after several reports of recent spam e-mails spreading the Storm Worm started appearing in larger than normal quantities. Some of these e-mails, using the subject line “F.B.I. vs. facebook,” direct e-mail recipients to click on a link so that they can read news articles centered on the FBI, and how it is investigating people on Facebook.

Storm started in early 2007, and has since spread, changed and split into other variants, each moving along online with little to stop them. Why is that? Because users are still clicking on the malicious links and installing the software when asked -- the saying is true that some users will click on anything at times. Storm and some of the other botnet e-mail tricks all start with the same basic idea, they send e-mail with a subject related to current events or known celebrity figures.

For the record, Brian Krebs at the Washington Post started the trend of wanting to look at subject lines in e-mail this week. With that idea, The Tech Herald keeps its own catch all for spam and Malware, so I looked at some of the recent subject lines Storm and other bots are sending.

Here is a list of some of the more interesting ones:

[Note: Most of the spam comes from overseas, so the English language is butchered in many of the e-mails, sometimes it is more amusing to see them attempt to spell names and places than it is to study the malicious attachments or links. There were thousands of e-mails similar to these in the TTH catch all. Page two has a larger list of subject titles.]

Church Group Offers Homosexual New Life In Closet

Al Qaeda Reports Declining Revenues in Fiscal '08

Hillary Clinton Sex Tape Shocker! [Damn right it’s a shocker, wow]

Britney Spears and Paris Hilton are lovers. Video proof

Angelina Jolie And Madonna Compete For Adoption Of Jamie Lynn Spears Baby

Arnold Says im Gay Too!

Bush Sells Louisiana Back to the French

Dark Knight jailed in alleged sexual assault

Gay Rights Terrorist Kills Eight In fabulous Bombing

Kids rob elderly, police open fire

Obama Captures Osama

The FBI offers the standard warning, which amounts to; never open or visit links to untrusted Web sites. Using a security package on your computer equipped with spam filtering will work in most cases, but not all. Nothing is 100 percent when it comes to spam filtering.

The best tip to remember is that if you simply want to read the latest news, go to Google or Yahoo, and start from there. If you want obscure news, and random gossip news, which is what most of the spammed e-mails report, then check out TMZ or other well-known gossip sites.

As promised, here are some of the e-mails caught in the TTH spam filters. Most are simply amusing, or play on current events; all of them were malicious in nature. The ones that were interesting, as they were likely test e-mails, included subject lines with 123 as the subject or emoticons such as :-) or :-)) and :-(

Aliens landed in Ohio

Justine Timberlake gay video

Lindsey Lohan died in car crash. Video

Paris Hilton nude on the beach

Hillary Clinton naked video

Hillary Clinton admits affair

Hillary Clinton Sues Barack Obama

Bush is gay

Aliens Abducted By Michael Jackson

All Baseball Players May Be Indicted For Steroid Abuse

American Idol found dead in bed

Angelina Jolie And The Lesbian Lover Watch

Angelina naked video (also: Angelina Jolie maked video)

Angelina Jolie Leaves Brad Pitt

Anne Hathaway dairies seized by FBI

Apple nosedives on Jobs' death

Apple's JObs has recurrence of cancer

Armed man kills hundreds in church

Arnold Schwarzenegger quits as Governer

Arnold Schwarzenegger to make movie

A-rod dropped from team

Avrile Lavine naked wideo

Barack Obama Caught In A Time Warp

Bomb scare in UK stops traffic

Brad Pitt And Angelina Jolie Sex Film

Brave Suicide Bomber Survives Blast!

Breaking News | Latest News | Current News

Breaking News, U.S., World, Weather, Entertainment

Britney Agrees to Sole Custody for K-Fed

Britney caught nude again. Watch.

Britney Spears naked in public! is she really that crasy?!

Britney Spears Stashed Guns In Her Vagina - Papparazzi Duck For Cover

Bush boycotts funeral for Tony Snow

Bush And Putin Agree To Restart Cold War During G8 Summit

Horse kicks Ralph Lauren in stomach [Ed: That’ll teach him for making those shirts]

Jessica Alba drops bikini top at Cannes

JFK memoirs reveal illegitimate son

Obama engages rappers in election aid

Oprah Winfrey Enters Race For The White House As Barack Obamas Running Mate

Paris Hilton Tosses Dwarf On The Street

Schwarzenegger gunning for Presidency 2012

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