BitDefender Offers Free Removal Tool for Polip.A Virus

(2006-04-28) Peter Gorman

BitDefender is one of the only anti-virus vendors to offer protection against extremely well-designed worm

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. - April 28, 2006 - A recently discovered computer worm named Polip.A and all its variants has been detected by BitDefender, using B-HAVE, BitDefender’s unique heuristic detection technology. BitDefender is currently one of the only anti-virus vendors to detect and offer a fix for Polip.A.

About Polip.A
Polip.A is a newly introduced and dangerous polymorphic file infector with a worm-like spreading capability. The virus targets .exe and .scr files and includes a number of advanced infection, encryption and stealth features, making it extremely hard for anti-virus solutions to detect and disinfect. Polip.A is aimed at Windows-based computers and spreads by sharing infected files on the Program File Directory and via the Gnutella file sharing network.

A memory resident worm which deletes a wide range of files from an infected system, Polip.A uses a number of different entry-points and mirrors itself to existing needed files. It also uses different encryption layers as part of its design, making it hard to decrypt. To date, there are nearly 500 mutations of the memory resistant virus. Polip.A. spreads itself when the infected files are opened or executed.

Free Protection Available
Due to its advanced design, most anti-virus solutions have been extremely slow to detect and develop a solution for Polip.A. BitDefender is one of the only security vendors to detect and protect its subscribers against all variants of the virus through BitDefender’s automatic updates. Those not protected will find a free download available on BitDefender’s website:
http://www.bitdefender.com/VIRUS-1000066-en--Win32.Polip.A.html.

Who: Dumitru is available to discuss Polip.A virus, what it means to consumers and businesses, the motivations of the worm authors, and the free removal tool offered on BitDefender’s website.

“Polip.A is a very well-written virus, and is a good example of the increasing engineering prowess that criminally-focused hackers and virus writers possess,” commented Bogdan Dumitru, BitDefender’s CTO. “The slow reaction by most of our competitors to this new virus demonstrates that most of the industry simply is not able to keep pace technologically with the enemy. Companies having to deal with massive amounts of red tape without a constant focus on new virus strains will always be steps behind the serious anti-virus companies like BitDefender. With our heuristics detection, we have again shown that we are miles ahead of the rest of the market and can take anything that the virus writers can throw at us.”

About BitDefender®
BitDefender is a leading European provider of security solutions that satisfy the protection requirements of today's computing environment. The company offers one of the industry's fastest and most effective lines of anti-virus and email security defense, setting new standards for timely threat detection and for simple installation, use and updates. BitDefender delivers effective threat management for over 41 million home and corporate users in more than 100 countries. BitDefender has offices in USA, Germany, Spain and Romania. Further information about BitDefender can be obtained by visiting: http://www.bitdefender.com.

Media Contact:
Peter Gorman of Topaz Partners
Email: BitDefender@topazpartners.com;
Telephone: +1 781-404-2430