Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!nuchat!sugar!peter
From: peter@sugar.UUCP (Peter da Silva)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: VIRUS TRAILS (Re: New Virus;deadly)
Message-ID: <1354@sugar.UUCP>
Date: 5 Jan 88 11:31:14 GMT
References: <17234@topaz.rutgers.edu> <1425@phoenix.Princeton.EDU> <8439@ism780c.UUCP>
Organization: Sugar Land UNIX - Houston, TX
Lines: 38
Keywords: killer virus on the loose
Summary: You're not paranoid enough.

I don't think you're paranoid enough. Just because people have been hiding
viruses in boot blocks up to now doesn't mean that's where they'll always
be. Real viruses hide in all sorts of places you wouldn't expect (I believe
Herpes goes dormant in the spinal cord between outbreaks), and computer ones
will be as effective in hiding.

Write protect all your utility disks, except when you're actually copying a
file to them. Hard disks are harder... you can always just not mount it while
trying untrusted software. That way you'd at least know something was wrong
when it hit the hard drive to erase all your files.

Also (this is to the ST guy):

And don't get fooled... a trojan horse is just a dumb virus. Just because your
computer has its O/S in ROM doesn't mean you're virus proof. I know a bit about
the ST, and there are quite a few places a virus would find nice and cozy.

Finally:

Do you think we should discuss some of these places viruses may hide?

	Pro: forewarned is forearmed (boy, I'd look funny with 4 arms).

	Pro: protection by ignorance has been shown to be a bad idea for
		mainframes.

	Con: since we can't do anything about many of the obvious places,
		it doesn't help to have more people know about them.

	Con: we're not the whole Amiga community, but we know there are
		virus authors among our ranks.

	Pro: if anyone's nasty enough to want to take advantage of our
		discussion, and good enough to do so, they've probably
		already figured out all the good hiding places anyway.
-- 
-- Peter da Silva  `-_-'  ...!hoptoad!academ!uhnix1!sugar!peter
-- Disclaimer: These U aren't mere opinions... these are *values*.