Tech Stream

Its Conficker, you Fools!

3 April 2009

Listen and download: MP3

The Conficker computer virus (or worm) has been infecting computers across the world since November 2008. It was supposed to unleash itself on April 1st, but the day came and went with little evidence of widespread destruction or mass chaos.  In some parts of the media people wondered whether it could have been an elaborate hoax?

IT security analysts certainly took the threat seriously, in fact Microsoft offered a quater of a million dollar bounty for information on the people behind the virus.  A majority of infected computers are in Asia and in the last couple of days experts have noticed increased activity as the virus instructs terminals to call home… but the cataclysmic effects just didn’t materialise.

IT journalist Patrick Gray presents the Risky Business security podcast and is the managing editor of Risky.Biz, an information security news outlet.  He wrote an interesting opinion piece for ABC News Online prior to April 1st and spoke with me late yesterday about the media hype around Conficker leading up to April Fools Day.  You can listen to the interview via the MP3 link at the top of this post.

The PM program on ABC Radio also covered the story, on Tuesday 31st of March and then on the evening of April 1st.