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Computer virus hits Canadian banks

TheStar.com - Computer virus hits Canadian banks

`Worm' attacks businesses that use Microsoft system

An apparently new virus that attacks business computers running Microsoft's Windows 2000 system hit at least two Canadian banks and several U.S. businesses yesterday.

At the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, the Zotob virus affected computers in the trading division and head office.

"There were some temporary outages in isolated parts of our business," said spokesperson Rob McLeod.

Automated bank machines, Internet and phone banking were all fully functional, McLeod said.

"We expect to have functionality in all our areas ... (this) morning."

The virus also hit BMO Nesbitt Burns, but customer service was not affected, said spokesperson Ralph Marranca.

"We got through this with no real impact on our customers."

ABC News, one of the U.S. companies hit by the problem, reported that computers at DaimlerChrysler plants froze for nearly an hour yesterday. Other reports said UPS Inc., General Electric Co., and Caterpillar Inc. had also been affected.

The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation said the virus was low-risk and not widespread, but that it would investigate. McAfee Inc., a California-based firm that makes anti-virus software, also described Zotob as low-risk. The origin of the virus is unknown, it said.

Microsoft said on its website that the virus, which installs malicious software and then looks for other computers to infect, takes advantage of a security defect that has already been addressed by a security update.

"Our investigation has determined that only a small number of customers have been affected," Microsoft said.

star staff and DOW JONES

August 17, 2005 at 10:09 PM in Virus | Permalink | TrackBack (3) | Top of page | Blog Home