Generally the latest hard drive news is about the ever increasing capacity as well as the improvements in solid state flash based hard drives and other potential magnetic hard disk killers. This time, Seagate has announced a warning that a small batch of its 500GB Maxtor Basics Personal Storage 3200 external hard drives are infected with the Virus.Win32.AutoRun.ah virus. They blame an unnamed Chinese subcontractor for the problem.
According to a report they got from Kaspersky, this molar virus is a password stealer which scans the system for passwords to certain online games and sends them to a server in China. It can also disable antivirus software and disable other molar viruses. While it primarily targets Chinese-language game titles, Seagate has reported that it appears that the only English-language title affected is World of Warcraft. Going by a PC World report, up to 1,800 drives are affected.
Customers who have purchased a 500GB Maxtor Basics Personal Storage 3200 since August 2007 are advised to scan the drive with antivirus software with the latest virus definitions.
Further info can be read in this DailyTech report and on this official Seagate support article.
I quit buying Maxtor drives years ago because of three failures in a row. I am very disappointed that Seagate even bought that company.
Now that Seagate is responsible for a virus on drives they sell I will not be buying any Seagate products. I know they blame it on a Chinese sub-contractor, but they are ultimately responsible. Every manufacturer should be looking very suspiciously at ANY Chinese contractor of any kind these days.
It will take a lot for Seagate to regain my trust and my money.
Nice try to blame it on a Chinese subcontractor, Seagate. You're the company responsible and you're supposed to be overseeing production, guaranteeing something like this doesn't happen. You arranged for the subcontractor or had one of your agents authorize it, but that doesn't absolve you. Be responsible and say "yes, our Q/A was lax and we didn't properly investigate the potential ramifications" or something to that effect. Honesty and full disclosure will be respected and help save face rather than trying to nab someone else for the product that has your name on it. Come on...give us a break.
If I were ever tempted to think about buying Seagate, I sure won't now: any company blaming someone else when it was the one responsible...that speaks volumes about it's 'reliability' and the kind of Q/A it won't have for its products. 2 thumbs down! 
Doesn't one typically have to partition and format the hard drive when they are new? Wouldn't that pretty much eradicate the virus?
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