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| In the worst hit offices, hundreds of printers have been spewing out gibberish |
Thousands
of office printers around the world have been spewing out page after page of
gibberish because of a computer virus.
Reports
from companies reveal that thousands of pages of paper were wasted when the
Windows virus hit their PCs.
Security
firms said the worst hit were large businesses in the US, India, Europe, and
South America.
The culprit
is a malicious program called Milicenso that has been re-used many times by
hi-tech crime groups.
In a
blogpost analysing the virus, security firm Symantec said Milicenso was first
seen in 2010 and because it was a "malware delivery vehicle for hire"
had turned up regularly ever since.
Its most
recent incarnation was as a tool for distributing French language adware.
Symantec said Milicenso could infect a PC by various routes, such as an email
attachment, via a compromised website or by posing as a fake video decoder.
'Garbled
printouts'
Once
installed, the virus polls a location on the net and re-directs web traffic so
it serves up adverts.
Symantec
said one side effect of infection was to generate a file in a PC's printer
queue. This turns the contents of the files in the virus's main directory into
print jobs.
"The
garbled printouts appear to be a side effect of the infection vector rather an
intentional goal of the author," said Symantec.
Victims hit
by the virus have reported its effects via discussion forums run by security
firms. In the worst cases, hundreds of printers have been generating gibberish
and wasting reams of paper.
Security
firms have now issued updates that should spot Milicenso and clean up any
infections.
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