Beware IM virus

This week's was an "early warning" from the Internet Storm Center (ISC, a Net security experts cooperative), but IM users and their parents should be on the alert. The ISC warned that the profiles of AIM users (the personal descriptions users provide which anyone can look up) are vulnerable to malicious hackers, Internet News reports. Basically, they attach virus-infected image files to the profiles, and send an IM to people enticing them to "go to my profile and check out this photo." When the photo's downloaded, the viewer's PC gets infected. Tell your kids not to be fooled by invitations like this especially from anyone they don't know (and they do know not to put any personally identifiable information in their profiles, don't they?!). The BBC calls these images "poisoned pictures." They have already turned up in an older, more techie venue called newsgroups. The BBC notes that only Internet Explorer browser users are vulnerable to this virus.