July 2001: Indicative of the 'Year of the Worm'

Data security and access is compromised daily by the many threats that are being coded by the hacker community. The popularity of worms has reached epic proportions in 2001 as evidenced by CNET News.com proclaiming 2001 as the 'Year of the Worm'. There are many countermeasures that can and must be taken by system administrators and information technology professionals. This paper discusses: the rise in attacks from worms; two worms making security headlines throughout the month of July 2001 including the essence of their structure and how to neutralize the infections; and preventative measures that can be taken by a company both at the perimeter and internal levels to help reduce the possible exposure to worms.