AIM users are being attacked by a worm that talks, according to instant messaging security company IMLogic. Its description of the worm it has called IM.Myspace04.AIM says:
This IM worm uses infected computers to send out messages over AIM. The infected host acts as a bot and responds blindly to messages sent to it, even sending messages such as "lol no its not its a virus" and "lol thats cool". One of the messages is a URL to a .pif file on the myphotos.cc domain. The full URL is available to IMlogic customers. (Note: This threat does not involve myspace.com.)
OK, so it's not much of a bot, but it's targeting an area where many users are not very sophisticated and their PCs may not have particularly good anti-malware defences. (Got tthe T-shirt: I had to get back control of a friend's PC where the young daughter had clicked to accept a Trojan file sent via IM.)
If you use IM, check to see if your anti-virus software covers this or if there is a plug-in for IM protection.
For more on the talking worm, see the CNet story, New IM worm chats with intended victims.
Update: In the original version of this post, I linked to the RAV series of programs for IM protection. As Garry has pointed out in a comment (below), the page is still there but you can no longer download the software. My apologies.
