Microsoft Windows XP Trojan Threat

Microsoft Windows XP Trojan Threat

With two days to the New Year, Microsoft has more troubles for their Operating System users as a new Trojan horse was found roaming in the wild. The bad news is that it even affects computers patched with the recent Microsoft XP Service Pack 2 update. Security Firm Symantec alerted media that the Trojan can let the infected computer of a user to be remotely controlled.

They have named it “Phel” after an anagram of the word ‘Help’. It spread to computers from malicious websites through the inbuilt web browser Internet Explorer’s help files. It makes use of a glitch discovered in October in the way help files are handled by the Operating System called from websites.

This flaw comes in addition to a similar flaw reported recently by a Chinese firm related to the way how help files are read by the OS. Microsoft criticized the company to release the exploit information without letting them release a fix first. Generally, such issues are sent to company first so that patches can be released before the information is widely spread.

Microsoft on their side has said that they are working on the fixes. There are four major flaws now, which are still unfixed in their latest Operating Systems. With holiday season going on, things might take a serious turn when users come back to their offices in a couple of days. Microsoft has also released a statement on what they are doing on this: “Microsoft is taking this vulnerability very seriously, and an update to correct the vulnerability is currently in development. We will release the security update package after complete the development and testing process.”