The open nature of online encyclopedia Wikipedia in which anyone can submit and edit articles is what has made the service a staple of the Internet. However, that same openness was used on Friday to hijack an entry and trick users into downloading a virus.

The German edition of Wikipedia was used as the vehicle to convince users to install what they thought was a "fix" for a new variant of the Blaster worm, which affected over 50,000 Windows computers in the summer of 2003. The attackers then sent out a German-language e-mail purporting to be from Wikipedia that told users to visit the page.


Almost immediately, Wikipedia and its active userbase took quick steps to remove the hijacked pages. However, previous versions of the page could still be accessed directly before they were removed by administrators as well.

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