SCO Group unwrapped a brand-new Website Feb. 2, a day after MyDoom.A knocked the company's original Website right out of cyberspace on day one of the worm's pre-programmed mass denial-of-service attack against the company.
But even as it did so, analysts continued to be dumbstruck at the severity of MyDoom.A's assault. "With such a program you could really take out any major Website on the Internet," Trend Micro president Raimund Genes told Reuters. "This is a form of electronic warfare. It's not terrorism, but it is somebody who is obviously upset with SCO."
MyDoom.B, a variant which emerged two days after MyDoom.A, has targeted Microsoft, which expects to unleash similar attacks Feb. 3, though MyDoom.B's attacks are not anticipated to be anywhere near as severe as MyDoom.A's - in large part because MyDoom.B wasn't spread as broadly as the first worm had been.
"Security experts are calling MyDoom the largest virus attack ever to hit the Internet, costing businesses and computer users around the world in excess of $1 billion in lost productivity and damage," said SCO chief executive officer Darl McBride in a statement after the new Website was launched. "Because one of its purposes is to interrupt access to the www.sco.com Website, we are taking steps to help our important stakeholders continue to access the information, data and support that they need from this new www.thescogroup.com Website."
McBride added that the $250,000 rewards offered by both SCO and Microsoft for help capturing MyDoom's creator(s) would help law enforcement get "serious leads" that would lead to the creator(s).
SCO continues to be careful, however, not to accuse Linux programmers or supporters of being responsible for MyDoom, an accusation the company leveled a few times in the past year when hit with comparable denial-of-service attacks, amidst its charges that Linux developers appropriate a component of SCO's Unix technology illegally.
