'Kriz' virus threatens crisis at Christmas

The Christmas virus threat re-emerged this week, with reports from McAfee that more than 1000 customers have been affected by holiday viruses over the past 45 days.

A variety of viruses with a festive theme are circulating. Prilissa is programmed to overwrite the AUTOEXEC.BAT file on December 25, while W23/Kriz is programmed to erase portions of computer hard disks on Christmas day. Kriz also attempts to flash the BIOS of a computer, which prevents it from booting properly and may force the owner to replace the system. Kriz is a mutant form of the CIH virus, which caused extensive damage to thousands of computers on 26April 1999 and on the same day in 2000, mainly in South Korea. Kriz has even been seen infecting other viruses, such as the Happy99.worm and W32.hllw.bymer.worm, helping it to spread faster. Kriz has been known about for more than a year, but it still poses a threat. A statement from anti-virus company Symantec said:"The CIH virus was also circulating in the wild for more than a year before it caused major destruction." "If no action is taken, [we expect] to see high numbers of damage reports from all parts of the world on December 25." Symantec released a patch for the virus on Tuesday. Other Christmas viruses, such as Navidad (meaning Christmas in Spanish), take advantage of the holiday mood by pretending to be festive email attachments.