Elvira Cortez, a fourth-year political science student, sat
helplessly in front of her computer. For 30 minutes, she vainly
tried to access her MyUCLA Web site, but to no avail.
Unknown to her, the culprit, which infected over 187,000 hosts
worldwide last week, had reached UCLA.
The MS Blaster worm and SoBig.F virus raised concerns last week,
prompting campus departments to update their anti-virus scanners
and implement emergency measures to delete infected e-mails
These had a “severe impact on Campus exchange servers and
(impacted) campus e-mail delivery,” and caused significant
interference for computer users, according to a campus bulletin
released on Aug. 19. by the university.
The worms targeted computers equipped with popular Windows
operating systems.
Despite the interference the Internet attacks caused, some
people expressed confidence in the university’s established
protections to deal with computer worms and viruses.
“The university was prepared for the worms, and they did
not cause major damage,” said Eric Splaver, director of
college information services, the department responsible for
maintaining the popular MyUCLA Web site.
“Our system automatically downloads any necessary patches
from the Microsoft Web site,” he said.
This ongoing function allows the university to minimize the
potentially adverse effects a worm or virus could have on the
system.
Though the worms were primarily responsible for last
week’s Internet interference, Splaver said, they were also
not the only reason for the difficulties.
But some areas of campus were not so lucky. UCLA Student
Media’s e-mail network was inundated with multiple e-mail
barrages, which clogged up accounts and left some unable to send or
receive messages.
Students who experienced computer troubles sought help on campus
during the outbreak.
Michiaki Kono, a third-year cognitive science student and a
computer technician at the Student Technology Center, said he saw a
surge of computer-related inquiries during the past week.
“The computer usually needs to be reformatted if it has
been infected,” Kono said.
Computer worms, unlike viruses, do not need
“carriers,” such as discs, downloadable programs or
e-mails.
Being connected to the Internet, for example, makes one
vulnerable to contracting the harmful program.
A tell-tale sign that a computer had been corrupted by the MS
Blaster worm is the computer restarting itself every 60 seconds
without user input.
The SoBig.F virus is contracted when users click on attachments
to e-mails carrying subject lines such as “Details,”
“Approved” and “Thank you!”
Some see the threats as becoming more sophisticated.
“More recently, we are seeing blended threats which are
programs that include hybrid worm and virus mechanisms, as well as
other code and exploits,” said Information Technology
Security Coordinator John DeGolyer.
Laws have been passed to punish Internet crime.
Section 502 of the California Penal Code stipulates that
creators and disseminators of computer infections such as MS
Blaster and SoBig.F can face stiff fines and lengthy prison
terms.
Last week’s outbreak is not the first time UCLA students
have dealt with computer infections.
Shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, an e-mail
containing a computer virus resulted in several deleted student
files and corrupted computer programs.
Free anti-virus software is available to all students from any
computer until October 2007 on the UCLA Academic Technology Web
site.
Information Technology officials recommend that members of the
UCLA community who suspect their computers have been compromised by
either the MS Blaster or SoBig.F worm log on to the Microsoft Web
site for software patches.
With reports from Daily Bruin wire services. To download
free anti-virus software provided by UCLA, log on to
www.ats.ucla.edu.