Almost a "file under Routine;" but with our few fans, perhaps a reminder is appropriate.

World Cup Virus Season Kicks Off eWeek, Matt Hines, May 8, 2006

Quotes in part:

The FIFA World Cup 2006 tournament won't get underway in Germany until early June, but computer virus writers are already attempting to cash in on the planet's most popular sporting event with viruses aimed at deceiving eager soccer fans.

Researchers at UK-based Sophos released notification of a new attack that infects Microsoft Excel files and has been disguised as a spreadsheet charting the national teams participating in the World Cup.

Once the World Cup virus has infected a PC, it begins forwarding itself to other people using the corrupted machine and may also send itself to people listed in any e-mail client software on the device, Sophos said.

The Excel virus marks the second World Cup-oriented attack identified by the company in the last week. On May 4, Sophos detailed a Trojan virus dubbed Troj/Haxdoor-IN, which cloaked itself as a wall chart of the teams competing in the tourney that fans could print out and use to follow the action.

Sophos has tracked threats tied to the event since as far back as 1998. And there is also reason for hackers to believe that they could succeed using such ploys, as the Sober.n worm virus—which misrepresented itself as an opportunity for people to buy tickets to the World Cup—was one of the most widespread computer attacks of 2005 worldwide.

End Quotes

You could get hurt just being a fan of soccer, and could hurt your friends if you pass one of these on.

These are just the first of many expected crudware attacks. Such exploit attempts often crop up around any "big event," but these are starting a little earlier than usual.

I know we don't have too many real soccer fans here, but the few who follow the rituals should be aware of the dangers. :-].

John