Some Maxtor Personal Storage 3200s shipped with virus

How convenient -- your shiny new Maxtor Basics Personal Storage 3200 may have come preloaded with a nasty virus right out of the box. That's right folks, you may not even need to open any suspicious emails or surf over to dodgy websites, as an undisclosed amount of drives produced by a company sub-contract manufacturer located in China were reportedly sent out with the Virus.Win32.AutoRun.ah program already loaded. Apparently, the molar virus is one that get its kicks by searching for passwords to online games (World of Warcraft included) and sending them back to a "server located in China," and as if that wasn't enough, it can also disable virus detection software and delete other molar viruses without breaking a sweat. In order to determine whether your drive is one of the lucky (or unlucky) ones, feel free to phone up Seagate with the serial number in hand, and if you haven't already updated your anti-virus software, now would probably be a splendid time to do so.

[Thanks, overseatrader]

[Paul @ Nov 12th 2007 2:11AM]

Do they test their products before they ship them or do they hope nothing is wrong with them?

[Jordsn @ Nov 12th 2007 3:59PM]

It wouldn't be logistically possible to test every drive sent out of a factory (this is why we get DoA product). The real concern is with Quality control at that particular factory, It is in an intentional act to add files to a drive, so they really need to find the employee who did it, its not like this was some procedure that broke down or something.

A similar incident happened with some iPods a while back too.

[Raptor007 @ Nov 12th 2007 4:43PM]

Uh, it's Maxtor...

(They just ship them.)

[Gogesch @ Nov 12th 2007 2:20AM]

"Feel free to phone up Seagate with the serial number in hand..."
I think you mean Maxtor

[Adrian Williams @ Nov 12th 2007 2:30AM]

Seagate owns Maxtor now

[gary73 @ Nov 12th 2007 2:30AM]

Well, Seagate owns Maxtor now.

[e_rocm @ Nov 12th 2007 2:31AM]

I think Seagate bought out Maxtor a while back.

[Twitchy @ Nov 12th 2007 5:49AM]

Yes, but did you know that Maxtor was aquired by Seagate quite recently.

[DRoseDARs @ Nov 12th 2007 6:49AM]

Uh, I hear there's rumors on the, uh, Internets that Seagate owns Maxtor now.

[Shelbz @ Nov 12th 2007 2:21AM]

At least it's not lead based paint that can double as a date rape drug when ingested.

[triptogenetica @ Nov 12th 2007 2:21AM]

I have that exact drive!
But, also have v uptodate AVG.
so, no problems there, then.

[Duncan @ Nov 13th 2007 6:02PM]

You have an up to date AVG, but the problem is the AVG engine isn't running.

[triptogenetica @ Nov 14th 2007 6:39AM]

No, have full and on-access scanning for all my drives - which tells me I'm not one of those with an unexpected lucky extra on my maxtor.

[triptogenetica @ Nov 12th 2007 2:26AM]

I have this exact drive!
But also AVG.
So, not a problem.

[o29 @ Nov 12th 2007 3:51AM]

"may have came preloaded"

Not to be a grammar nazi, but come is the past participle of come. Sorry, it just sounded wrong.

Carry on.

[james @ Nov 12th 2007 4:26AM]

I have two of these. Luckily i reformatted both of them ages ago and use them on a mac anyway.

[Ignatius @ Nov 12th 2007 5:21AM]

And while you tout the greatness of your OS, soon, more and more will be joining the fold and then cybercriminals everywhere will smirk as they code malware for your system and thus begins the never-ending cycle of AV updates versus hacker innovation.

Just shut the hell up already.

[james @ Nov 12th 2007 5:48AM]

Are you insane or just hyper sensitive?

[Raptor007 @ Nov 12th 2007 4:45PM]

Not insane, just jealous I think.

[Cougar @ Nov 12th 2007 4:40AM]

This is pure cyber-terrorism!

If i were Seagate i would call to FBI for investigation. :D

[3rdsun @ Nov 12th 2007 5:14AM]

Maxtor hard drives are so shitty, why the hell did Seagate want them anyway, just makes Seagate look like shit too

[Jamie @ Nov 12th 2007 5:53AM]

Awesome, I just ordered a Maxtor hard drive. Not this specific model but, if I know about this I would have gone with a different brand.

[Raptor007 @ Nov 12th 2007 4:45PM]

Hitachi ftw. :¬)

[Twitchy @ Nov 12th 2007 6:05AM]

WTF does some hacker want my BF2 login for? I can't even get the damn 'Pistol Combat' badge.

[JoeSmack @ Nov 12th 2007 6:37AM]

what the heck is a 'molar virus'?

[friendlyner @ Nov 12th 2007 10:48AM]

w32.cavity

[applefreak @ Nov 12th 2007 8:20AM]

that stinks

[prokanda @ Nov 12th 2007 10:36AM]

Wouldn't expect any less from Maxtor. Back in the win 3.11/95 days I had 5 of these fail on me back to back (all different models/sizes). I finally just stopped calling them for their free replacements. WD all the way bay-bay. 4 internal and 2 external. WD makes Maxtor look like amateurs.

[CL @ Nov 12th 2007 11:25AM]

I am still looking for someone to beat my record for the shortest lifespan of a drive. I bought an internal drive just before Seagate bought Maxtor out to replace another Maxtor drive that failed after 4 months, and the new drive operated less than 24 hours, yes...24 hours. Go Maxtor.

[Tim Ficke @ Nov 12th 2007 12:16PM]

Now why isn't there a website?

[Pavan @ Nov 12th 2007 3:05PM]

Gives a whole new meaning to the term "Viral Marketing" At least they didn't try to blame MSFT like Apple did when they shipped those iPod videos with a bonus bug

http://www.apple.com/support/windowsvirus/

[Dragod @ Nov 12th 2007 5:11PM]

Damn, you beat me to it.
That really pissed me off. It's like Apple can't pass up a chance to take a cheap shot at Microsoft, even when it's their own damn fault.

[Dav1dfv @ Nov 12th 2007 3:40PM]

What are we all complaining about?
Since when freebies are not good? They'll probably come up with an antivirus program bundled with the HDD next!

[4cr JaXs @ Nov 12th 2007 7:54PM]

It is time to boycott EVERYTHING coming out of China.

[tekdroid @ Nov 13th 2007 2:14PM]

pretty hard since everything comes out of China.

[4cr JaXs @ Nov 13th 2007 3:06PM]

You're telling me.

[Mr_boogie @ Nov 13th 2007 3:20AM]

just don't forget to run an AV before you start installing your computer....

[Andrew Crisp @ Nov 13th 2007 3:51PM]

I'm on the phone with Seagate customer service right now.

I hate outsourcing. I can't understand the person on the other end, and I have a feeling that I'm never going to find out whether or not my drive was one of the affected. Sigh.

[scott @ Nov 14th 2007 3:25AM]

Another Recall of the Day from China. China is full of people with absolute NO ETHICS!

I bought one from Staples.com last month.

Just looked on the back of label and mine said
"Product of Thailand - other items marked thereon" so I have no idea where the drive came from China, and I'm not breaking warranty seals to look inside.. I'm gonna call Seagate tomorrow to give them an earful.

[energyvortex @ Nov 15th 2007 2:53PM]

Sounds like it's time to fire up the ole Class Action Lawsuit against Maxtor. I don't wnat to even imagine the pain and suffering a well put together case could cause them. Everyone and their mother could end up claiming all kinds of other damages after using one of these on their machine...

[Pete Steege @ Nov 16th 2007 1:44PM]

I work for Seagate. Here are some more facts about what happened:
- a small number drives were infected (I don't know the number) by a Chinese sub-contractor
- all the drives still in the factory and inventory have been reworked and are free of the virus
- we're providing a free 60-day version of Kasperski Lab 7.0 to those who bought a drive that may have been infected
- the virus affects the following games (all Chinese except World of Warcraft):
WSGame
91.com
QQ
Woool
rxjh.17game.com
TianLongBaBu
AskTao
Perfect World (Wanmei Shijie)
World of Warcraft

- Here is the Maxtor Customer Support website that has the link to the free Anti-Virus software.

http://support.seagate.com/downloads/ps3200/

- The drives were infected accidentally from a contract worker's MP3 player
- Maxtor products are manufactured by Seagate, which bought Maxtor about a year and a half ago.

Read my blog: storageeffect.com