Tech Shout!

Internet security company Sophos has claimed that it has located the first-ever OpenOffice.org virus. A worm for the OpenOffice package which delivers a pornographic picture of a merchant banker in a bunny suit engaged in relations with a scantily-clad woman.

Microsoft must surely be on top of the world hearing the news that the first virus has appeared in OpenOffice.

But, according to antivirus specialist Sophos the SB/BadBunny is a worm that affects Windows, Linux and Mac systems, but appears to be more of a proof of concept rather than a malicious code.

As the SB/BadBunny virus stands, it does not actually cause any damage to the system, but rather it highlights vulnerabilities.

To become infect, users must open the OpenOffice file badbunny.odg, after which the worm behaves differently depending on what operating system OpenOffice is running on.

“The group responsible for writing the BadBunny malware doesn’t seem to have much confidence in it spreading as they have sent it directly to our labs,” saidGraham Cluly, senior technology consultant for Sophos.

“The hackers have written plenty of StarBasic malware in the past, but the most ‘in the wild’ this one is likely to get is by displaying a picture of a furvert in the woods,” he added.

This is old-school malware - seemingly written to show off a proof of concept rather than a serious attempt to spy on and steal from computer users. A financially motivated hacker would have targeted more widely used software and not incorporated such a bizarre image. This is not a piece of malware which we expect to see spreading in the wild, despite its use of a photograph of unusual wildlife,” added Cluley.

To be safe, users should not execute macros included in OpenOffice,org documents unless they are sure of their source.