Grand Theft Auto mod virus uses YouTube to spread

Sample image from GTA: Hood Life

(Credit: FaceTime Security Labs)

Someone is using a Grand Theft Auto mod video as a way to trick viewers into infecting themselves. Although YouTube videos remain safe to view, that hasn't stopped criminals from finding new ways to entice YouTube viewers to get infected with the latest Trojan horse. The latest example is a Grand Theft Auto video for a mod called Hood Life. According to Chris Boyd, Director of Malware Research at FaceTime Security Labs, the graphics in the mod are lame. He says the images used in the video are circa 1986, crudely rendered, not up to the high standards of the GTA game itself, yet at least 54 people have nonetheless downloaded the game.

GTA: Hood Life download image

(Credit: FaceTime Security Labs)

Watching the You Tube video is safe. The danger comes at the end when the video displays a site where you can download the game mod itself. Should you download the file and install, your computer will be compromised upon reboot. Boyd says that if you really want this gangsta game, "switching off the PC pretty much spells doom, gloom, and other things ending in "oom," because once the desktop reappears, you'll discover that the only drive-by performed today was on your computer."

Boyd notes that he's seen other YouTube video where the criminals teach you how to write and distribute viruses. In this case, the video acts only as a distribution for an already complete package of malware hosted somewhere else.

[Saint Alvis]

Mod? What mod?

Robert, did you actually watch the video in question?

At no point does it claim to be a set of files to modify an existing GTA game. The author claims to have created his own PC game (explaining the crude graphics) that recreates "every action that you can do in san andreas".

[LoPhat101]

Probably doesnt help that the author is posting it in Modding forums, then

Meh, it could easily fall under the categeory of "total conversion" (for all we know, he started with the original game then stripped everything out and replaced it all), and even without touching the original game, claiming to "recreate every action that you can do in san andreas" certainly sounds like a modification / updating of the original game to me, even if only in terms of a different execution of the original premise.

Theres a number of GTA forums where whoever made the game has posted it in the "modding" section, too

<a class="jive-link-external" href="http://www.gtaforums.com/index.php?showtopic=282207" target="_newWindow">http://www.gtaforums.com/index.php?showtopic=282207</a>

Certainly seems like a mod is the impression the creator wants to give off, if nothing else.