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First and foremost I just want to say that this is not an April Fool's Joke. If you know me, you know that I do not do those things. Especially when it's something this serious.

The Conficker worm is a computer worm that can infect your computer and spread itself to other computers across a network automatically, without human interaction. You may not even know that you have this virus/worm/trojan because it hasn't been activated yet.

I first heard about this on CBS's 60 minutes special Sunday night with Lesley Stahl. You should definitely read the article here. Conficker burrows it's way through the internet slopping itself on each and every computers hard drive it comes across. Here's the catch though, while it's been active for almost a year - it hasn't been red-flagged because it wasn't malign. It changes a variant of itself every 5 minutes making it tough for the guys who crack these things to protect you. But they have found something MAJORLY important. On April 1st the virus is set to receive instructions from whoever programmed and circulated it. Telling it to do whatever they want. 

THIS MAY INCLUDE DIVULGING ANY AND ALL SENSITIVE INFORMATION ON YOUR COMPUTER. I REPEAT THIS IS NOT AN APRIL FOOLS JOKE.

Looking at a real Facebook page, Trilling explained, "We added your friend and colleague Morley Safer, you can see down there on the left." 

He says a worm can crack into a Facebook account, like Morley's, and send a message to anyone on his friends list. 

It's a message a friend or colleague, like Stahl, would be sure to open since it comes from a trusted friend. Stahl took the bait and clicked on what looked like Morley's video link. 

"Something looks a little off," Trilling remarked. "You're already infected." 

As Trilling demonstrated on a second screen, the hacker "owned" Stahl's online movements. "From here on out, everything you do, gonna show up on the hacker's machine," he explained. 

So when Stahl typed her username and password into a bank Web site, it appeared instantaneously on the hacker’s screen, along with her bank account details. 

"Every single keystroke you hit, in fact, if you make a mistake and hit a backspace, that shows up in the window," Trilling explained. 

The hacker then followed her around, as she browsed the Internet from CBS News to Amazon.com. 

"So, if I buy something, they’re gonna have my credit card," Stahl remarked. 

"Everything you type in, your address, your credit card, it’s all gonna show up in that window," Trilling warned.

My advice to you is this: If it isn't utterly necessary to do so, stay off the Internet on April 1st. Unplug your routers, and anything you have connected to it. Just could throw the monkey wrench into your life. You may be saying that I am going paranoid, and that may be so but I've actually seen friends get infected and held hostage by their computers. This could all very well just be a scary prank meant as a joke... or it could be the real thing. I myself think it's better to be prepared and to be secure just incase because you never know. 

I will go on a rant and say this. It's like protecting yourself during intercourse. Even though there IS a chance you may not get a disease or procreate you do not take that chance. You protect yourself with the appropriate methods. Same thing applies here. Be safe people.

To check it out further and to leave your thoughts on the virus, head over to Braingasim's post on our forums here.

By: Leugim