Malware is one of the managed service provider’s (MSP’s) worst professional nightmares, so it’s no wonder so many viruses have names that sound like horror movies. In honor of Halloween, let’s take a look at this rogue’s gallery of malware, all with the potential to make your hair stand on end. Learn about them in this edition of Tech Time Warp.
The Creeper
The Creeper was the first computer worm, designed in 1971 by Bob Thomas at EBN Technologies. Announcing itself with the ominous message “I’M THE CREEPER. CATCH ME IF YOU CAN,” the Creeper would attempt to print something from a machine on the ARPANET (the precursor to the internet) and then jump to another machine. The Creeper had no additional payload because it was actually a demo for a resource-sharing program. Still, the possibility a computer could do this left chills.
The Creeper also led to the first antivirus: the Reaper, developed by Thomas’ co-worker Ray Tomlinson and designed to remove the Creeper.
Ghostball
Ghostball, a virus discovered in October 1989, haunted its victims far more than the Creeper. As of one of the first-known multipartite viruses, Ghostball attacked both a computer’s boot sector and its program files at the same time. Simply turning on the computer launched a destructive payload. Ghostball scanned machines for .COM files to infect. Infected files grew by 2,351 bytes and might display the message “GhostBalls, Product of Iceland Copyright © 1989, 4418 and 5F10 MS DOS 3.2.”
Frankenstein
Frankenstein, like the Creeper, was a prototype of the horrors that could be. Developed in 2012 by Vishwath Mohan and Kevin Hamlen at the University of Texas at Dallas, Frankenstein searched software such as Internet Explorer and Notepad for bits of code called “gadgets.” Gadgets performed small tasks. The researchers’ goal was to prove that by combining gadgets, Frankenstein could create malware following algorithms. What’s more, it could vary the gadgets it used from machine to machine, making it harder to detect.
From the Creeper to Frankenstein, these digital ghouls remind us that malware has always had a flair for the dramatic. As technology evolves, so do the threats, making it all the more important to stay vigilant, even after the Halloween decorations come down.
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Photo: Vladimir Sukhachev / Shutterstock
This post originally appeared on Smarter MSP.