Introduction: What happened to Mr. Sasabe?
Introduction: What happened to Mr. Sasabe?
I have found that
I know very little about the virus problems that plague the virtual world,
but with the creation of new technology, we create new problems as well.
I have heard a little about viruses killing hard drives and things, but
I am weary to think that what happened to Mr. Sasabe could happen to me
at any time because I sit at those same computers that he did in Porteus.
I know that his problem, from what it sounded like, came without notice
and inflicted a lot of damage on his webpage, disks, and computers.
I remember as a sophomore in college, there was a virus scare that hit the campuses across the US where a person planted a computer virus that was supposed to be released through the web and reach anyone online and infect their hard drives. It was the first of its kind where a virus could threaten to destroy the entire online community. I saw postings all over campus warning people to protect themselves. I am not sure if it was a joke or if a virus could travel through the net and inflict damage. I imagine that there is a way to plague the net in that fashion.
I know that I spent and will spend many hours working on new ideas on my page, but a virus would discourage me if the hours I put in suddenly mean nothing. Knowing this, I have to be worried because I use shared computers at UH. Worse yet, because I never really thought of this problem, I have not installed any anti-virus software on my Mac at home. It could ruin everything, and I know that this is more than crashing a hard drive. It is where starting over means altering everything and behaving differently like, using new disks, using other computers, and even trying to find the computers and disks that are infected. All of this amounts to more than retrieving lost information; this means starting from scratch like you never worked at it before. This can be devastating to anyone. I certainly hope that he survived this ordeal.
I had a feeling that this was the way computer hackers live their lifestyle. I can honestly see them leading one life of corruption in front of the monitor and then see them leading a normal, yet double life somewhere else. I can see that this is a very difficult criminal to catch because there is no "murder weapon," no "fingerprints," and no tangible evidence of one person. We probably don't fight this war on the ground, but in the global village where aliases, anonymity, and firewalls can protect this faceless criminal. It sounds like an X-Files episode, but it's real. It happens, and there are people who have the technical knowledge taught to them by higher education and now they use it to inflict harm.
There are no real laws in cyberspace and cyber-burglary runs rampant in the global village. In addition to breaking and entering, cyber-arson takes place and there is nothing to salvage. It is imperative that we find a way to track these people down and put them in jail. In generalizing the hacker, I highly doubt that they are armed and dangerous. They look like normal people and probably act like normal people in the real world. Yet, the instant they enter cyberspace, their predatory nature is exposed. I also feel that they have a certain invincible nature to them because they think they won't get caught. I certainly hope people like this know that things will catch up to them sooner or later.
Computer
Viruses: Lab Users Beware Many think of computer viruses as a computer sickness that can make your computer explode while you sit an helplessly watch as a skull comes on your screen and laughs as it eats your computer alive. You may hear a little scream as your computer dies and you are forced to watch you Mac disintegrate into a hopeless plastic mess. Thankfully, that is a myth. Yet, as found on the internet, computer viruses are a very evil and serious thing. We should take this computer menace very seriously because it can strike without anyone knowing....
When reading virus definitions on Symantec's homepage, I could only sit and wonder how can such things become so dangerous. According to Symantec, a virus is, "A piece of software designed and written to adversely affect your computer by altering the way it works without your knowledge or permission." There are two things we have to be aware of when dealing with viruses. First, viruses infect only software. They cannot affect you monitors, printers or other hardware. That's the good news. The bad news is that it infects your software and can get pretty creative and destructive in infecting everything in your hard drive such as applications (Microsoft Word, ClarisWorks) files and documents, and the boot sector (the start-up portion of all hard disks and floppies). That means that once a file is infected, it can affect the application which in turn can infect all files created in that application, which could find its way to your disk, ready to infect any machine it comes in contact with. Viruses spread quickly, and can inflict much damage on your computer.
Their purpose is simple: infect, infect, infect. Viruses cannot spontaneously appear; viruses must be created. They must be deliberately written and placed. I imagine that computer programmer do this type of thing because it takes ICS type knowledge to create one, especially the ones that melt your hard drive and tell you while it does. I guess that reasons vary as much as the people who make them. Perhaps they are angry at the world or at an employer. Perhaps they like this kind of thing and get a kick out of mass destruction. As long as there is a possibility of creating havoc, reasons will vary.
There are two basic types of viruses: benign and malignant. Benign viruses inflict no damage but put annoying messages on your computer like, "I am watching you" or things like that. The other type is the malignant virus which we all should be aware of because malignant viruses are created to inflict damage. All viruses, whether benign or malignant serve basically two functions: The first function is to spread itself from one file to another without the victim's knowledge. This is called self-replication or propagation (source: Symantec). The second is to implement the symptom or damage planned by its creator. Included in this would be erasing a disk, corrupting programs, or causing your computer to go haywire. This is called the virus payload (source: Symantec). Viruses work by placing infected code into a file code or an application code (like MS-DOS) which will travel everywhere that file or that application goes. That makes for a pretty mobile and contagious infection.
They spread or propagate by means of code traveling through disks and machines. A simple formula can work like this: An infected machine that had a bad code to begin with goes haywire and infects a disk. That disk is used at the computer lab where people share the computers. Now the machine is infected and everyone who uses that computer will have infected disks and those disks infect other computers.... The infections work the in the same manner as AIDS within a community and work like cancer within a disk or hard drive. Viruses may also infect computers through the internet, and that can be extremely dangerous when viruses spread effectively in that medium.
Lots. Under the two named types (benign and malignant), different viruses attack different parts of software and do different things to them as well. There are ones that infect files as well as ones that infect applications. There are macro viruses that infect within applications and are activated when the victim uses different functions, like "save as." All of these viruses have the ability to spread and to infect as they were created to do. Still, as creative as the human mind can be, viruses will also be as creative. Unfortunately, viruses can strike at any time and by the time the user ever finds out, it is too late....
Famous
Viruses and Their Damage
There have been
a lot of famous viruses that have killed many a computer in their day.
Still, the reasons for their creations vary from a simple programming error
to malicious and vengeful intent with devastating consequences. A person
scorned for some reason has really nothing to lose when anonymity is preserved.
Oftentimes, a "creator" will leave a signature mark, much like
a villain in the old Batman TV show. Some of the famous viruses have kept
people on alert and in essence has created new ways of dealing with them
such as anti-virus software and hoax investigation. Due to its "War
of the Worlds" frenzy, I will talk about hoaxes in another section.
Here are some famous viruses worth noting:
The Trojan Horse
In literal terms the Trojan Horse is not a virus, but a virus type. I think that this was worth noting because this type of virus has malicious intent written all over it. According to Symantec, The Trojan Horse disguises itself as a legitimate program and when it is executed, it covertly causes damage to your computer. Unlike other viruses, Trojan Horses do not replicate, and are most frequently distributed through online services or public domain bulletin boards. In plain language, this means that this virus type can enter as something we want on our computer such as a shareware program or even as a Netscape upgrade and when the horse is opened through opening the new program, we think we have something neat, but in reality, our computer is dying inside. This is scary to me because it can spread through the internet which means faster, stealthier movement of this type of virus.
ANTI
ANTI sounds a lot like hepatitis because it has two different strains: ANTI A and ANTI B. Strain A was discovered in February of 1989 and strain B was discovered a year later, in September of 1990. They were both discovered in France. It seems that ANTI does not infect files, but applications and files that resembles applications. This means that our files are not normally touched, but the application that created them will go haywire. Applications are anything that can be used to create something, like MS Word, ClarisWorks, and anything that can be opened to use, possibly even games. VirusScan and other virus detectors cannot repair the applications perfectly, so that means that you might need to replace the drive or get another computer if ANTI infects applications. Additionally, ANTI can infect applications that are never run, so you Performa users can get your Mangia or Eric's Solitaire Sampler infected even though you never use them.
The Alliance
Th Alliance was
a US born virus (a lot come from Europe) and made its debut in the summer
of 1996. It infects the documents in Microsoft
Word. Once a system is infected, the macro-virus replicates with documents
and templates. The Alliance Virus is date sensitive and replicate only
on the 2nd, 11th, and 12th of the month. If this virus is activated, it
displays the message, "You have been infected with the Alliance (Source:
Network Associates)."
I think that this virus was deliberately created to really make people's
virtual lives miserable. I mentioned earlier that some viruses are created
because of bad code written within applications, but this was made deliberately
to cause damage. This virus can be devastating.
Atom
Of the viruses I have researched, I think that this is another one that really can get people angry. This virus, similar to the Alliance, is another one that was created by someone who wants to destroy things. Well, Atom is another Macro-virus which is activated in Word with certain commands such as "File-Open" (or apple-O on the Mac) or "File Save. (apple-S)" When an infected document is opened on December 13, the virus deletes all files in the directory. Among other things, it can and will password protect your documents under certain conditions that add up to 13. I think that if the creator is ever caught, he should be forced to fix every hard drive he has infected BY HAND.
Virus Myths and HoaxesWhat are Virus Myths?
Virus Myths are the virtual "War of the Worlds" on the internet. Simply explained, virus myths are created to scare people into believing that there are viruses that exist and do more than they are capable of doing thus creating a mini "anarchy" in the virtual world. Virus myths are spread most often by newsgroups and email. This is how one could be done: I think up an fake virus that will make your hard drive never be able to save anything, and make you monitor explode. I post it on a newsgroup telling everyone what it is, how it works, and when it is set to strike. People then become afraid of it and they email and tell their friends about it and through telling people, virus myths are then Propagated.
Why do People Propagate Viruses?
Simple. Fear and caring. Put it this way: You have a date and you go and watch Titanic. You love the movie and so you tell your friends to go and see it. They do. They like it, and they in turn tell their friends. In a similar way, virus propagation is spread out of fear of the virus and a care for one another. You fear the virus after reading the posting. So, out of care for your friends, you tell them to beware of a virus that could devastate their computers. They in turn, tell their friends, and so on. People don't really mean to spread hoaxes, but most people can't really tell the difference between what's real and what's fake. In a similar feat, what if the Honolulu Police Department treated every bomb threat on campus (I've been through a bunch) as a fake? They can't risk that one time when one could be real, so they treat every hoax as if it were the real McCoy. We do the same when we see a virus hatching on the net, whether real or not.
What can we learn from them?
There are a lot of things that come to mind when I think of virus, and I know that there is a lot to be learned from them. Throughout history, when mankind makes a headlong breakthrough toward progress, there are things that go with it we never accounted for. An example of this was when Columbus discovered the new world in 1692, he claimed it for the Crown of Spain and for Christian conversion. This breakthrough led to millions of deaths on both sides due to disease. When we "invented" the net, we made the world smaller than a monitor. People pioneered it, like Marc (Mr. Netscape) Andreesen. People made advances in it, like Bill Gates (who once called the internet a passing fad) and there are people who destroy using it. I have mentioned this wacko concept before, but when people use a wonderful thing like the internet for their own selfish (and sometimes evil) purposes, the internet can become a weapon. With viruses like ANTI and the Alliance, people create horrors over the internet.
Can Biology Help?
A lot can be learned from biology when it comes to viruses. The reason they are called viruses like the ones in medicine, is that they cannot live outside its host. So, for now, the movie Virtuosity is just fiction. Biology has "evolved" to give us new strains of virus and with it comes a whole new set of rules. AIDS started out with one strain. Now there are more to look out for. In cyber-space, viruses have also evolved, either by accident or on purpose. Whatever the case, there are a lot of people who spend a lot of time trying to identify them and hopefully, how to eradicate them. We now have anti-virus software that is supposed to protect us from viruses, but they do require a lot of updating to keep your computer and files infection free. Like biology, there will always be something new and there will always be someone trying to learn how to kill it.
Viruses and the Generations What has Generation 8 Done about it?
As I have said before, Faith Matsuda will win awards for her pages and reports. Her report on Viruses was very thought-provoking. Take a look at it...
Also, look at Brandon Suetsugu and his report as well. He works in the computer lab and that experience shows on his report.
Taking the Next Generational Step...
My advice to the generations in the future: Well, first of all, GET YOUR WORK DONE EARLY!! I can't emphasize that enough. I really mean it. Don't test this one. As far as the virus report is concerned, use the links that Dr. James gave you as a starting point, but don't stop there. There is a lot more to these reports than a few links. Use the search engines (I know you know how to use them) to hunt down some cool things and Hunt the newsgroups. Search high and low for information on these things because new viruses are born all the time. The Social science labs try to update their stuff every 30 days (I emphasize try) and they still could be behind. I know what I am talking about because in the middle of this semester I was infected with the CAP Macro-virus that messed up Microsoft Word on my hard drive, in all of my files, and in the hard drives of other computers I have used, including the one I am typing this report on right now. I had to convert a lot of things to ClarisWorks and information got lost in the transfer. So, with that in mind, Happy hunting......
