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Conficker Worm

Conficker is a worm which can exploit systems that are not protected. It is set to "call home" on April 1, 2009. Users may not see any obvious effects of the worm, but that does not mean it is not present. No one is certain what the intent of the worm is.

One simple way to know if you have the worm is to try to connect to your anti-virus vendor's website to download a fix. If you are infected, the worm prevents you from doing so. Because of the unknowns associated with this worm, Intuit feels it is vital to update our customers and help them protect their information. Use the information below to protect yourself.

For a more detailed description of the worm, see the Conficker description.

Recommendations for individual users:

To help protect yourself, we recommend following our guidelines to secure your computer. However these steps will only protect you if you are not already infected with the Conficker worm.

If you are already infected, a number of anti-virus vendors have made standalone remediation tools available for cleanup. However, Conficker can block access to official anti-virus updates so contact your anti-virus vendor via the phone to determine how to clean the infected computers.

The Conficker worm can be passed via USB keys, so ensure you also run the anti-virus solution on your USB drives that may have come in contact with the infected computer.

Microsoft's website includes a summary of all their findings for Conficker, including a Malicious Software Removal tool that will help you clean up your computer if it is infected.

The Internet Storm Center is maintaining the comprehensive list of Conficker remediation software.

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