• An experiment designed to test how a program might move between computers. • The First Computer Virus,Creeper,was named after a Scooby-Doo cartoon show character.Creeper was written in 1971 by BBN computer programmer Bob
Thomas.BBN, Bold, Beranek, and Newman,now Raytheon BBN Technologies,developed packet switching networks for ARPANET
1974
Wabbit
• A self-replicating program that made multiple copies of itself on a computer until it bogs down the system to such an extent that system performance is reduced and eventually crashes. Researchers named this virus “wabbit" (rabbit)
because of the speed at which it was able to replicate. • Rabbit(or Wabbit)virus was developed in 1974,did have malicious intent and was able to duplicate itself.Once onacomputer,it made multiple copies of itself,severely
reducing system performance and eventually crashing the machine.The speed of replication gave the virus its name.
1982
Elk Cloner
• Elk Cloner is one of the earliest widespread, self-replicating viruses to affect personal computers. Elk Cloner displayed a friendly little poem on the infected system: "It will get on all your disks; It will infiltrate your
chips; Yes, it's Cloner!" •15-year-old high school student Rich Skrenta developed the Elk Cloner virus.Skrenta already had a reputation for developing computer tricks among his friends at a time before the word "virus"
had even been conceived.
1986
Brain Boot Sector Virus
• Generally regarded as the first virus to infect MS-DOS computers. Its origin stems from two brothers in Pakistan who created it to test loopholes in their company's software. • the first PC virus,began infecting 5.2"
floppy disks in 1986. As Securelist reports,it was the work of two brothers, Basit and Amjad Farooq Alvi,who ran a computer store in Pakistan.
1986
PC-Write Trojan
• Malware authors disguised one of the earliest Trojans as a popular shareware program called "PC-Writer." Once on a system, it would erase all of a user's files. • Its origin stems from two brothers in Pakistan who created
it to test loopholes in their company's software.1986-PC-Write Trojan: Malware authors disguised one of the earliest Trojans as a popular shareware program called "PC-Writer." Once on a system,it would erase all of a user's
files.
1991
Michelangelo Virus
• It was so named because the virus was designed to erase information from hard drives on March 6th, the birthday of the famed Renaissance artist. The virus was at the center of a wild media storm with panicked reporters claiming
that it had infected millions of computers and that the world would see dire consequences on March 6th. In reality, the virus only impacted about 10,000 systems, but the hype significantly raised public awareness of computer
viruses.
• The Michelangelo virus isacomputer virus first discovered on 4 February 1991 in Australia.The virus was designed to infect DOS systems, but did not engage the operating system or make any OS calls.
1999
Melissa Virus
• Generally acknowledged as the first mass-emailed virus, Melissa utilized Outlook address books from infected machines, and mailed itself to 50 people at a time. •The Melissa virus,reportedly named by Smith forastripper
in Florida,started by taking over victims 'Microsoft Word program.It then used a macro to hijack their Microsoft Outlook email system and send messages to the first 50 addresses in their mailing lists
2000
I LOVE YOU Virus
• Spreading by way of an email sent with the seemingly benign subject line, "ILOVEYOU," the worm infected an estimated 50 million computers. Damages caused major corporations and government bodies, including portions of the
Pentagon and British Parliament, to shut down their email servers. The worm spread globally and cost more than $5.5 billion in damages. • ILOVEYOU was created by Onel de Guzman of the Philippines.It was one of the first
worms to effectively use social engineering to prompt victims to open the files, an innovation that was copied by many later forms of malware.
2001
Anna Kournikova Virus
• Emails spread this nasty virus that purported to contain pictures of the very attractive female tennis player, but in fact hid the malicious malware. • The Anna Kournikova computer worm was written by a 20-year-old Dutch
programmer called Jan de Wit on February 11,2001. It was created to trick email users into opening a message purportedly containing a picture of tennis player Anna Kournikova,but it actually contained a hidden malicious
programme.
2003
SQL Slammer Worm
• One of the fastest spreading worms of all time, SQL Slammer infected nearly 75,000 computers in ten minutes. The worm had a major global effect, slowing Internet traffic worldwide via denial of service.
• The potential for what would become the SQL Slammer worm was originally discovered by the security expert David Litchfield.In 2002, the "bug hunter" ethically developed two methods to bypass the prevention mechanisms
built into a version of Microsoft SQL Server.
2004
Cabir Virus
• Although this virus caused little if any damage, it is noteworthy because it is widely acknowledged as the first mobile phone virus. • The first real mobile malware,Cabir,was released in 2004. It targeted the Symbian
operating system,used primarily by Nokia,and spread via Bluetooth.The worm was sent out by attackers as a proof of concept and was soon built upon for more malevolent purposes.
2005
Koobface Virus
• One of the first instances of malware to infect PCs and then propagate to social networking sites. If you rearrange the letters in "Koobface" you get "Facebook." The virus also targeted other social networks like MySpace
and Twitter. • Originally, Koobface infiltrated email,VOIP(like Skype)and social networking sites on Microsoft,Mac and Linux systems.It was reported mainly in the U.S. and Australia,with some reports in Europe.
2008
Conficker Worm
• A combination of the words "configure" and "ficker", this sophisticated worm caused some of the worst damage seen since Slammer appeared in 2003. • The Conficker worm got its start in November 2008,when it was discovered
by Microsoft Malware Protection Center infecting computers via two mechanisms, NetBIOS(network shares,or across a corporate network with shared resources)and later USB thumb drives.
