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This photo slide scanner costs €60... The bundled malware? That's free

Pre-pwned device on sale riddled with worms

German firm Tchibo has admitted to selling a photographic slide scanner that came pre-packaged with malware.

The €60 (£48) 35mm slide scanner, sold by retail outlets and through Tchibo's online store, and manufactured by electronics accessory maker Hama, was infected with the infamous Conficker worm.

In an advisory to customers, Tchibo offered affected customers refunds while pointing out that the device can be safely used after the virus has been removed with a modern antivirus application.

Conficker-B is present on the DCIM.exe and autorun.inf files of infected devices, Heise Security reports. Two years ago, Microsoft disabled the Autorun feature that served as worm bait during the original Conficker outbreak of 2009, so running the executable is the most likely means of infection.

Cases where consumer electronic devices are sold pre-infected with malware are far from infrequent. Normally the problem stems from an infected computer passing on the pox during the manufacturing or testing process. ®

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