[alt.postmodern] MIDI viruses?

rlp@beach.cis.ufl.edu (Bob Powell) (01/17/90)

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

rlp@beach.cis.ufl.edu (Bob Powell) (01/17/90)

Sorry 'bout that last one (the MIDI virus thing).
The original posting was on alt.cyberpunk.  I sent
the follow-up, and didn't check the Newsgroups
line.  I don't know why the original was also
supposed to go to alt.postmodern as well as
alt.cyberpunk.  Didn't mean to clutter this
group.

Just in case, did anyone here find anything interesting
in the followup? :)