Warning: MegaUpload Virus Attack

[lazy12]

I work in the tech support field, and lately a great many people coming to me saying that their computer was running very slowly/giving them the BSOD/weird programs installing themselves/one case of a computer being turned into part of a botnet. All of these problems have one common cause: MegaUpload. It seems as though their server was compromised and is now sending out viruses to users who download anything from them. These attacks are affecting all operating systems, not just Windows, and in particular Macs and Windows seem to be especially vulnerable to the really nasty ones.

Use caution if you download anything from MegaUpload (I would recommend staying away from it for now), but if you really want to use MegaUpload, I would recommend having a strong anti-virus program activated.

[StarSaber]

Do you happen to know what browser the infected are using? Is it all IE or FF? Or all?

[Zxien]

It won't be browser based, if all the files on one of mega uploads servers were compromised, all a user has to do is download the file and open it.

[Astor]

thanks for letting me know

[Gears]

Crap! That sucks. D: All the yaoi I upload and share is on MegaUpload. ;__;

[Oni_Yuri]

Oh dear God. I use MU all the time...
Thank you for the warning O.O

[chocolocoist]

thanx for the warning ^_^

[vizard light]

i just downloaded from MU this morning

[garnetyuna]

what?! I just downloaded from MU today and yesterday too!
these are really bad news, thank you for telling us!

[lazy12]

For everyone who has downloaded from MegaUpload recently, I would suggest using a virus scanner to make sure your system is clean. Even if the scan reports your computer as being clean, keep an eye on it for a while- some viruses are smart and disguise themselves as anti-virus software so that a virus scanner won't detect them. I've even seen them disguise themselves as operating system files. I've seen this especially prevalent in systems running Windows Vista or 7.

If your systems shows itself as clean, watch for these things:

If your computer starts booting up but doesn't show anything but a black screen, and it does this consistently (not just once or twice but it works fine the rest of the time), REFORMAT YOUR HARD DRIVE IMMEDIATELY. This will cause you to lose your data, but it's a lot better than having the police show up at your house. If it is doing this, your computer may have been hijacked. In some cases, these hijacked computers are used for illegal activities. In some cases, however, the malicious software will have written itself into the hard drive itself, and reformatting it will not make a difference. If you reformat it, reinstall your operating system, and it still continues to give you trouble, go buy a new hard drive.

If your computer will not go into safe mode, it's likely that it has a virus. In some cases, you may be able to use a search-and-destroy program to get rid of it, but it may come down to needing to reformat the hard drive again. In this case, however, it's not always necessary if you can remove the bad software.

If your computer constantly gives you the BSOD (Famous Windows error known as the Blue Screen of Death), either your hardware is going bad or you have a virus. An anti-virus program should take care of the problem.

If you use Linux and experience kernel panic, this is pretty much the same thing as getting the BSOD in Windows.

All of these things have happened in result to the MegaUpload virus attack. At this point, I would say that unless downloading from MegaUpload is a matter of life and death, do not do it.

If all else fails, take your computer to tech support. If you need some help, feel free to ask me, but I might not be able to do a whole lot without the computer right in front of me.

Hopefully this helps.

Also, just because your computer blue-screens once or comes up black once doesn't mean that you're infected. Sometimes computers just do that. The time to worry is when it does nothing but that, or if you can't get into the safe mode.