Beware the worm that gurns

Antivirus experts have discovered a worm that pulls a silly face at its victims.

This worm, dubbed Wurmark-F, also travels as an email attachment, but when opened displays a photo of a man gurning -- a British tradition of pulling silly faces.

Sophos reported that when run, the worm installs a Trojan that allows hackers to take remote control of infected computers and capture information.

"At first glance some may think this worm is harmless, and be amused by its graphical payload, but it has the sinister intention of handing over control of your PC to remote hackers," said Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant for Sophos. "If you attach a new, unpatched computer to the Internet, unprotected by proper firewalls and up-to-date anti-virus software, then it can easily be under the control of hackers within 10 minutes."

Users were confronted with another abusive worm earlier this week that sang the words 'you are an idiot' at its victims.