14 DAY TRIAL // The popularity of the newly-released GTA IV makes new victims on the web as hackers are now looking to exploit new vulnerable computers using the popular game. According to security company DriveSentry, hackers rolled out malware-infected copies of GTA IV on popular file-sharing applications such as Limewire. Once downloaded and installed, the fake GTA IV copy drops said malware, leaving the computer opened to future attacks.
"People are exploiting the popularity of Grand Theft Auto IV in a way which could bring mayhem to the Internet. The only thing that many gamers can think of at the moment is Grand Theft Auto IV and hackers are using that interest to try to generate chaos as quickly as they can", John Safa, chief technical officer of DriveSentry, commented.
This is not the first time when hackers attempt to take advantage of the GTA IV frenzy. Just after the official launch of the game, web attackers started sending spam messages to millions of inboxes, asking users to visit certain websites that claimed they were offering the XBOX 360 and PlayStation 3 game.
However, today's case can have more serious consequences, especially due to the growing popularity of P2P networks. LimeWire is said to be one of the most popular file-sharing platforms with approximately 36.40 percent of the P2P users while uTorrent, a popular BitTorrent client, came the second with 11.30 percent, according to data provided by MP3newswire.net.
"While surfing on Limewire, I found a file claiming to offer a program for the XBOX 360 version of Grand Theft Auto IV that actually contained malware named Trojan Downloader.Win32.VB.dck", John Safa added.
According to various security advisories, the Trojan Downloader.Win32.VB.dck is a Trojan horse capable of bringing more malware packages on the affected computer, waiting for remote commands from the attacker. As usual, users are advised to keep the anti-virus solutions up-to-date with the latest virus definitions and avoid downloading suspicious files from the web.