cheeser@pro-charlotte.cts.com (Les Kay) (01/09/88)
Ok, this virus thing is getting out of hand. The very first virus ever, was
created by my ex-roommate and ex-partner as a means of copy-protection of the
Apple ][+! He was attending IIT at the time and one of his dorm mates broke
into his disk box and, to make a long story short, the vanilla version of the
virus ended up traveling the world, attaching itself to any and every disk,
destroying thousands of disk world-wide.
My partner, when he learned of the virus (for the Apple), managed to abtain an
infected disk and thereby discovered that it was HIS virus that was on the
loose (and later learned how it had gotten loose in the first place). So, he
created antigen dos. What this is is a virus (Yes folks, another one) that
does nothing but check to see if the original virus (or mutants, this original
disease dos was able to mutate - quite a clever thing really, plus a few jerks
had created their own versions, he checked for them all) was on the disk. If
it was, it KILLED the virus. But not itself. This is important. to be
truely effective, antigen dos must spread itself, just like the virus it
fights.
What'ts the point of talking about an Apple Disease Dos? What the Amiga
community needs is and Antigen AmigaDOS. this way, those folks that don't
use usenet, telecom services, bbs's or usersgroups, about 75% of amiga owners,
who would otherwise never hear of the Virus, will get the same protection as
those of us that do use these services. And, eventually, the Virus will be
extinct. And that saves us all.
So, someone out there in net land, write a truly useful program. Write a
new virus. Write Antigen Dos. It should do the following:
Copy itself to any disk it comes in contact with.
check the boot blocks for the virus (Not by checking for normal boot blocks,
we don't want the antigen to clobber copy-protected software, check
the virus specifically)
Restore normal boot blocks if the virus is found.
Maintain a level of cloning counter. Each antigen dos copy should have in
a generation number. Each time antigen dos is copied to a new disk,
the copy should be numbered one higher than itself. If the number
reaches say, 255 and there is no virus found (any time a virus is
found, the counter should reset to zero), it should kill itself and
cease spreading, 255 without a hit is likely to be leading in a dead
end direction.
Eventually, there will be no virus and no antigen. Perefect situation. Back
to square one.
Suggested methods of transport:
In the bootblocks of disks with normal bootblocks (remember, we don't want to
kill copy-protected software!)
Hidden in unused blocks of a disks
Attached to other files.
As a self copying file/patch to dos itself running produces a message
reassuring the user of the purpose of the program.
I myself no longer own an amiga, so I won't be able to do this one myself and
my partner does not own an amiga either. So why not make a real name for
yourself, write this today!
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