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From: rlp@beach.cis.ufl.edu (Bob Powell)
Newsgroups: alt.postmodern
Subject: Re: MIDI viruses?
Summary: Sure, I'll speculate!
Keywords: MIDI virus wow
Message-ID: <21794@uflorida.cis.ufl.EDU>
Date: 16 Jan 90 22:09:38 GMT
References: <679@s5.Morgan.COM>
Sender: news@uflorida.cis.ufl.EDU
Reply-To: rlp@beach.cis.ufl.edu (Bob Powell)
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Organization: Bad Bob's Byte Basilica
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In article <679@s5.Morgan.COM> jordan@Morgan.COM (Jordan Hayes) writes:
>Are there any recorded cases of MIDI viruses?
>
>Anyone want to speculate on such a thing?

Sure I'll speculate!

I wonder what one would sound like, if it got played.  Since
MIDI information is "just" data, I'm not sure if it could
be used to transmit a virus.  If I'm not mistaken, a virus
has to "run," that is, be a program of some sort, though it
can be a very small program.  MIDI transfers information
between systems (in this case, musical instruments), but the
information doesn't "run" by itself, and it never gets
the chance to.  Now, if a virus infected a system transmitting
MIDI data (such as a sequencer or PC-based MIDI recorder),
it could certainly send bad data.  Or, it could send a
sequence of MIDI data that would activate a virus-infected
system, where the virus would lie dormant until such activation.

Just a couple ideas.

Bob