FRANK SESNO, CNN ANCHOR: The FBI is assessing reports about a new computer hacking program that can shut down Web sites. The company Network Security Technologies, or NetSec, as it's known, says it discovered breaches on 2,000 commercial and home computers. NetSec says the hacking program masquerades as a downloadable file such as a video clip, and that virus detectors do not -- cannot stop it. Well, CNN Justice correspondent Pierre Thomas has been tracking this story, joins us now with more. Pierre, just how serious a threat?</s>PIERRE THOMAS, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, this morning, the FBI met with officials from that particular company. They're still trying to assess exactly what we have. They just tell me on the phone they do not know, and they say that, look, they need to do further assessment. However, some major antivirus companies are putting out on their Web sites that this threat is low.</s>SESNO: That the threat is low. So the question becomes this? Did the circuit breakers, when such threats are discovered, the proper circuit breakers, go off, so that if this were a real deal, individual owners and businesses could take timely precautions?</s>THOMAS: Yes, this worked pretty much the way it should work. Security companies are playing an increasing role in term of alerting the FBI about potential threats. That's what happened here. They called the FBI and they said, we have noticed this, we think it's a problem. The FBI said, let's take a look at it. And what normally would happen is the FBI would so an assessment and then put the information out in an alert. That has not happened yet, so we're still premature in the process.</s>SESNO: And we'll be hearing more today about the nature of this threat and what they're finding.</s>THOMAS: More today. And we should point out, one of the reasons that we're seeing this is hat there's increasing sensitivity to cyber threats, that 20 to 30 new viruses are unleashed every week.</s>SESNO: Every week. Pierre Thomas, thanks.
FBI Assesses Reports of New Computer Hacking Threat