Worms are replicating programs that propagate throughout the internet using emails, remote logins, etc. Worms also has phases much like a virus; dormant, propagation, trigger, and execute. Worms can hide themselves as system processes. One of the most famous worm was the Morris Worm that targeted Unix files over the internet. The number of hosts increases exponentially and the number increases in the middle of a worm’s life. The main objective to counter a worm is to identify it and stop it in its early life. Some of recent worms were Code Red, Code Red 2, SQL Slammer, and Mydoom. Worms are sophisticated, they are platform independent. They are also multi-exploit, polymorphic, and metamorphic. They are also a very good tool of transportation of other attacks such as denial of service. Worms countermeasures are more or less like virus countermeasures.
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