Quiz - Computer Viruses

1. Mydoom, also known as Novarg or Shimgapi: E-mail worm discovered in January 2004, got activated during February 2004. Inside the virus code, the author had mispelled "my domain" as "my doomain" and thus the name Mydoom. The virus mail comes with extensions like .exe, .bat, .cmd, .pif, .scr or .zip. Mydoom.A was programmed to start a denial of service (DoS) attack on the SCO website www.sco.com from 1st February 2004. The virus also had a trigger to stop spreading on 12th February 2004. SCO had to temporarily take off their www.sco.com site and use www.thescogroup.com during the period of the attack. MyDoom.B was coded to attack the Microsoft website.
2. The Mydoom e-mail worm, also called Novarg, is programmed to start a denial of service attack on 1st February 2004. The virus infested e-mail comes with extensions like .exe, .bat, .cmd, .pif, .scr or .zip. The virus also has a trigger to stop spreading on 12th February 2004. Link: Symantec page on Mydoom.
3. The first virus: Fred Cohen, a PhD student at University of South California, demonstrated the first documented computer virus on November 10, 1983 as an experiment in computer security. The name 'virus' was given by Len Adleman, Fred's seminar advisor. The virus was added to a graphics program called VD that ran on a VAX mini computer. Links: History of Viruses at cknow.com.
4. Slammer or Sapphire is a worm (or a virus) program that attacks Microsoft's SQL Server 2000 and MSDE 2000 - Microsoft Data Engine. It appeared in the early hours on 25th January 2003, although there are reports of it existing since 20th January. Links: Description of the Slammer worm at F-Secure website, Initial report of the Slammer or Sapphire Worm, at securityfocus.com.
5. Prisilla is a PRI and Melissa variant.