Media Alert
IMPact Index at 8; FaceTime Reports Reuters Messaging Back Online
Customer Networks Remain Uninfected
FOSTER CITY, Calif. - April 15, 2005 - Reuters safely restored its instant messaging service at 07:00 GMT on Friday, 15 April after temporarily suspending service on Thursday, to protect its customers. Reuters decision to suspend the service came after a handful of customers reported they received instant messages, inviting them to visit a website which contained infected software. Although this was not an attack on Reuters, the company decided to take precautionary measures to protect its customers by preventing Reuters Messaging (RM) from being used to propagate a variant of the Kelvir worm.
The majority of Reuters customers run proper compliance, firewall and anti-virus protection and therefore were not infected. Furthermore, Reuters customers who were running the latest version of RM - 4.0 - were immune to the worm. Version 4.0, which is offered as a free upgrade, has been available since October 2004.
Reuters immediately started investigations into the worm variant, working with CERT (the Computer Emergency Readiness Team) to provide resolution. As a result, the site where infected users were directed was shut down. Reuters has also implemented remediation via automatic filtering through its datacenter. No intervention is needed by customers however Reuters recommends that customers upgrade to Reuters Messaging 4.0.
FaceTime Makes An IMPact
The FaceTime IM and P2P Activity (IMPact) Team is the only focused and specialized intelligence and response organization addressing the rapid proliferation of new IM and P2P threats and provides an aggregate risk level of the day's threats, with the IMPact Index. The IMPact Team is comprised of FaceTime's security experts working from FaceTime's U.S. and India locations to monitor, analyze and report on all malicious IM and P2P-related activity. The team delivers documented countermeasures to the IT community at large to instantly defend against the latest attacks. For a comprehensive list of IM and P2P threats and the latest threat index visit the IMPact Center: http://www.facetime.com/impactcenter
Helping Companies Stay Secure
As part of its security initiative, FaceTime offers remediation that will enable full protection against new flaws from propagating and causing serious network damage. FaceTime's Enterprise Edition products provide detection and blocking for real-time communications traffic on your network.
FaceTime also offers a Vulnerability Assessment Survey and Test (VAST), a free service that helps companies identify potential IM and P2P threats in their enterprise. The assessment consists of three conclusive steps including evaluation of existing IM and P2P network policies, procedures and products; specialized testing for real-time communications-based vulnerabilities; and a detailed report with resolution recommendations. To sign up for a vulnerability assessment, visit http://www.facetime.com/vulnerability
About FaceTime Communications
FaceTime Communications enables the safe and productive use of instant
messaging, Web usage and Unified Communications platforms. Ranked number one by
IDC for four consecutive years, FaceTime's award-winning solutions are used by
more than 900 customers – including nine of the 10 largest U.S. banks – for
security, management and compliance of real-time communications. FaceTime
supports or has strategic partnerships with all leading public and enterprise
IM network providers, including AOL, Google, Microsoft, Yahoo!, Skype, IBM and Jabber.
FaceTime is headquartered in Belmont, California. For more information visit
http://www.facetime.com or call 888-349-FACE.
The FaceForward blog, at http://blog.facetime.com,
offers thoughts and opinions about the changing nature of Internet communications.
PR Contact:
Joshua Barnes
A&R Edelman
650-762-2865
joshua.barnes@ar-edelman.com
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