Worms

Worms are especially dangerous for several reasons:

• Ability to self-replicate: Worms can spread without human intervention, through email, networks, or external devices.
• Ability to saturate networks: They generate excessive traffic, can collapse entire networks, and even cause critical services to crash.
• Gateway to other threats: After infecting a system, they often install backdoors, mine cryptocurrencies, or become part of malicious botnets.

Additionally, they often exploit security vulnerabilities on unpatched systems.An example of this is BlueKeep, a vulnerability that could be exploit to generate worms in Remote Desktop Services.

The first modern computer worm was Creeper (1971), designed as an experiment to spread on ARPANET. However, it was Robert Tappan Morris with the Morris worm (1988) who demonstrated the destructive potential of computer worms by collapsing networks and infecting thousands of computers.

Later, more sophisticated threats appeared such as Conficker (2008), a hybrid worm that spread locally targeting computers on local networks as well as globally by randomly probing any computer on the Internet. Currently, modern attacks that combine worms with cryptocurrency mining are detected on corporate networks.

Although both are types of malware (new link), worms and viruses have key differences that set them apart:

1. Regularly update your operating system and applications. Apply critical patches.
2. Install an advanced security solution such as Panda Dome, which detects anomalous behaviors on the network and blocks infections in their early stages.
3. Enable a firewall and close non-essential ports.
4. Don't open suspicious-looking links or files.
5. Make periodic backups to recover from potential damage or ransomware (new link).