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Virus Profile: W97M/Rapmak.a

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Virus Profile information details
Risk Assessment: Home Low | Corporate Low
Date Discovered: 4/9/2002
Date Added: 6/19/2002
Origin: Unknown
Length: N/A
Type: Virus
Subtype: Macro
DAT Required: 4072
Removal Instructions
   
 
 
   

Description

This is a virus detection. Viruses are programs that self-replicate recursively, meaning that infected systems spread the virus to other systems, which then propagate the virus further. While many viruses contain a destructive payload, it's quite common for viruses to do nothing more than spread from one system to another.

Indication of Infection

The virus will display the above message on the 13th of the month.

Methods of Infection

Opening infected documents will directly infect the local Word environment and any document used thereafter.

Aliases

Word97Macro/Rapmak.A (CA)
   

Virus Characteristics

This threat is detected as W97M/Generic. W97M/Rapmak.a infects Word97 and Word2K documents and templates. The virus contains one module - DPMmay2000 and disables the macro warning for Word97 and sets security level to low for Word2K.

If day is 13th of the month, the virus will cause the computer to beep and will also display the following message on closing the document:

   
Use current engine and DAT files for detection and removal.

It is very common for macro viruses to disable options within Office applications for example in Word, the macro protection warning commonly is disabled. After cleaning macro viruses, ensure that your previously set options are again enabled.

AVERT Recommended Updates:

* Office 2000 updates

* Malformed Word Document Could Enable Macro to Run Automatically (Information/Patch)