Fergie's Tech Blog

Hidden-code flaw in Windows renews worries over stealthly malware

Robert Lemos writes in SecurityFocus:

Last week, the Internet Storm Center, a group of security professionals that track threats on the Net, flagged a flaw in how a common Microsoft Windows utility and several anti-spyware utilities detect system changes made by malicious software. By using long names for registry keys, spyware programs could, in a simple way, hide from such utilities yet still force the system to run the malicious program every time the compromised computer starts up.

Already, some spyware authors seem to be playing with the rudimentary technique to try and hide their programs, said Tom Liston, a handler for the Internet Storm Center and a network security consultant for Intelguardians.

"We have seen indications that someone is trying this technique out," Liston said. "Basically, we have seen code that is stuffing a key in the registry with a huge length. Yet, the author still doesn't have it working."

A Microsoft representative said that the company is investigating the report, but does not consider the problem an operating system flaw.

posted by Fergie @ 8/31/2005 05:55:00 PM