Printer worm doesn't give a Hoot

by admin May 12, 2006 at 6:38 pm

Worm sends image of an owl to a number of predefined print queues

An odd worm is circulating through computer systems trying to print off images of a fake owl on network printers.

Hoots-A is written in Visual Basic and spreads via network shares. Once it has infected a computer it attempts to send a graphical image of an owl with the legend ‘O RLY?’ to a number of predefined print queues.

The worm is thought to be the work of a company employee who sought to jam up his own company’s machines but failed to realise that the worm would spread.

Full story: vnunet.com