Worm outbreak feared after port scanning spike - silicon.com

Worm outbreak feared after port scanning spike - silicon.com: "A surge in scanning on a port associated with a Windows flaw patched last week suggests that a mass worm attack may be imminent, experts said.

A rise in activity on TCP Port 445 could be a sign that hackers are trying to exploit a flaw in Server Message Block, Gartner analyst John Pescatore said on Thursday.
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Symantec saw a spike in scanning on TCP Port 445 last week but the probing of the port has since gone back to normal levels, Huger said. "I don't think we should be screaming the barn is burning by any means," he said."

You should always take what you hear in the news with a grain (sometimes bag) of salt, but situations like are an acceptable reason for alarm. Time to get those patches rolling!!