History Of Computer Viruses
A computer virus is the nightmare of every computer user. It is a computer program that can replicate itself and corrupt a computer, attacking several programs depending on its severity. Virus is, in common, a general term for all kinds of such programs, malware and spyware, although the latter do not have the ability to replicate. |
The Internet is the most common mode through which viruses get transmitted to the unsuspecting user’s target computer.
The history of computer viruses dates back to the early 1970s. Before the advent of the Internet, there was the ARPANET. Bob Thomas from BBN wrote an experimental self-replicating program called Creeper Program in 1971. This virus generally infected computers running the TENEX Operating System. As a cure to this virus, Reaper was developed.
Creeper was developed under experimental conditions. But the first virus that made its presence outside a lab was the program “Rother J”. It was created in 1981 by Richard Skrenta. This virus, which was first injected in a game on a floppy disk, spread through floppy disks. And the first PC Virus was developed in Lahore, Pakistan by the Farooq Alvi brothers. It was called Brian.
With the advent of personal computers, there came Trojan horse programs. Many viruses were written to infect popularly traded software. As a result, anti- virus software were developed and today have become a must for personal computers, especially those which have Internet connection. Companies like Symantec and McAfee are common for their anti-virus programs which provide protection against the hard-to-detect viruses or hidden viruses.
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