The battle between malware creators and security researchers will always be ongoing in this digital age. As you may expect, however, the former generally tends to have the advantage as the latter is nearly always left to react and find a remedy to the new formats and tactics deployed.
In a report via ZDNet, however, the latest malware risk may be arriving via a very unusual source. An official warning has been given that malware creators have started using WAV audio files as the ‘cover’ for the insertion of malicious code.
WAV Files Are Being Used to Deliver Malware
The method of delivery used is being referred to as “steganography”. In other words, the ‘hiding in plain sight’ delivery within a seemingly innocent form. This isn’t, of course, a new tactic for creators of malware. To date, however, this has usually been within the remit of image files. Any way you look at it, this delivery method clearly makes detection far more difficult.
Since the start of this year, at least two separate incidents of WAV files being infected with malware code have been identified. As such, this may be the new tactic deployed to try and get some nasty stuff hidden away on your PC or mobile device without you, or your antivirus software, ever knowing.
What Do We Think?
The utilization of WAV files is perhaps, in itself, a mild curiosity. While the media format is still used, it is nowhere near as prevalent as it was 10-15 years ago. In fact, I can’t honestly remember the last time I encountered a .WAV file format.
The short version is though, be particularly wary if you do engage in the downloading of WAV files. You don’t know what might be lurking within. Perhaps more concerning, your antivirus probably won’t either!
What do you think? Could this new delivery format create some big problems? – Let us know in the comments!
