Conficker.C employs new infection methods,
disables security products

The Conficker virus continues to spread and evolve. New reports from security researchers warn that the next variant of the virus, called Conficker.C, will become active and malicious on April 1, 2009. This variant includes new functionality that ranges from new infection methods to disabling of security tools. The Conficker.C virus will scan and kill processes for security products including disabling: firewalls, patch deployment (MS08-067), and antivirus or active protection software. In addition to using internal networks as the means of attack, Conficker.C is believed to use Peer-to-Peer (P2P) networking to infect other vulnerable systems.

FREE HEALTH CHECK OFFER FROM SHAVLIK TECHNOLOGIES

Shavlik is offering a free, non-intrusive health check to help customers protect themselves against infection by the Conficker/Downadup Worm. The health check will examine physical and virtual machines running Microsoft operating systems for the presence of patch MS08-067, which addresses a vulnerability in the Windows Server service that this worm exploits. In addition to performing a scan for this patch, the NetChk Health Check will also examine specific configuration settings that Microsoft and other security experts have recommended to minimize the risk of becoming infected.

Testimonial

“Thanks to NetChk Protect, we were able to achieve a 95% patch compliancy within a week of MS08-067 release. As of today, we have 1 server out of 444 that is missing the security patch (99.8 % patched!!!)”

Before NetChk Protect:

“We didn’t have any way to easily track deployments. We used Windows Update on individual servers. The manual deployment of something like this to 400+ servers would’ve been a huge undertaking. Talk about a waste of man hours!! To be able to deploy (at any time our customers wanted) and audit progression, it easily saved thousands of dollars in wasted productivity.”

Midwestern US Energy Company

Shavlik Simplifies Patch and Configuration Management so You Start Your Assessment Sooner and Protect Your Network Assets Faster

Shavlik’s solutions simplify patch and configuration management through automation, increased visibility, and control. It is easy with Shavlik products to target the application to assess for specific patches and configuration settings, thereby speeding the assessment process and minimizing the impact on IT operations and the organization. The Shavlik solutions are automated, easy to implement and easy to manage so you can be scanning your environment in a matter of minutes rather than days or weeks.

Shavlik’s industry-leading agentless technology ensures enterprise-wide detection, including systems that are not managed by Active Directory or virtual machines that are offline and dormant. By not having to deploy and manage agents, users of Shavlik solutions can start faster and finish sooner. And that is critical when time is of the essence as it is with the Conficker/Downadup worm.