Computerworld

McVeigh case spawns Trojan horse

Using the promise of a video of Timothy McVeigh's execution, a hacker tried to entice chat room users to download a common SubSeven Remote Access Trojan, according to anti-virus software company SaferSite.com Inc.

"It's a fairly common Trojan virus that was going around, but it had a unique way of tricking people into using it," said Brad Bales, chief executive officer of SaferSite.

The virus was introduced in a chat room, where a hacker produced instructions that provided a user with a series of links which purportedly led to a video of the execution, Bales said. Instead, the virus was download onto a user's machine.

The service provider where the link was created has since taken the Web link down, Bales said.