Harry Potter worm virus at large on Windows

If you’re crazy about Harry Potter and you can’t wait to see the movie and get a hand on the merchandise, there’s something out there that has Harry Potter that you don’t want. A new worm has hopped aboard the bandwagon and is annoying users everywhere.

There’s still no lead on the origin of the worm and what to do about it. All that’s known at this point is that the worm, called W32/Hairy-A, can be transmitted like regular malware and through removable drives.

If a USB drive is inserted to a port on an infected PC, the worm copies itself to the device, then copies itself to a new host PC and does weird and annoying things to your computer.

Symptoms include starting up to find new user accounts in Windows named after the book’s characters, a text document that says Harry Potter is dead, a change in your browser’s home page, and a greeting that tells you to repent from your sins because the end is near.

According to IT experts, the code does no big harm, but the act of tampering with a system is against the law. They also say that whoever wrote the code is not after financial gain but is just out there to make a statement.

If you’re crazy about Harry Potter and you can’t wait to see the movie and get a hand on the merchandise, there’s something out there that has Harry Potter that you don’t want. A new worm has hopped aboard the bandwagon and is annoying users everywhere.

There’s still no lead on the origin of the worm and what to do about it. All that’s known at this point is that the worm, called W32/Hairy-A, can be transmitted like regular malware and through removable drives.

If a USB drive is inserted to a port on an infected PC, the worm copies itself to the device, then copies itself to a new host PC and does weird and annoying things to your computer.

Symptoms include starting up to find new user accounts in Windows named after the book’s characters, a text document that says Harry Potter is dead, a change in your browser’s home page, and a greeting that tells you to repent from your sins because the end is near.

According to IT experts, the code does no big harm, but the act of tampering with a system is against the law. They also say that whoever wrote the code is not after financial gain but is just out there to make a statement.