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Re: Viruses


At 09:51 AM 2/3/98 EST, Paul wrote:

They [viruses] come in surprising ways. Could be on a floppy you
forgot to reformat,

Paul, are you saying that a format will remove a virus which is lodged in
the boot sectors?????

A format of a *floppy* creates a whole new data structure including
the laying out of new tracks and erases everything currently on the
disk, including boot sectors. It even resets the media descriptor
byte.

Many systems currently permit a quick format which does not do all
this, simply erases the file allocation tables and does a few other
things. In this case, boot sector viruses would not be removed.

If you're really paranoid, wave it around in front of a big magnet
and then reformat.


occasionally viruses have come in on installation disks
from major software vendors . . .

As far as I can tell the virus came on the MS DOS 6.22 INSTALLATION discs
directly from Microsoft. I found it on the Boot Disc that the Installation
process allows one to make at the time of instalation.

Weird!!!


Jim Green

That has been known to happen. Several years ago there was a minor
scandal over a major software vendor (and I believe it was Microsoft
but I don't recall -- maybe some Mac Word install disks?) that
distributed a shrink-wrapped virus which hopped off of their internal
systems and got mass produced.

On the other hand, if that disk had been used by someone else and had
been made writeable then the virus could have copied itself from
their system. Ya never know. You can download McAfee from the web. It
cleans most anything.








Paul J. Camp "The Beauty of the Universe
Assistant Professor of Physics consists not only of unity
Coastal Carolina University in variety but also of
Conway, SC 29528 variety in unity.
pjcamp@coastal.edu --Umberto Eco
pjcamp@postoffice.worldnet.att.net The Name of the Rose
(803)349-2227
fax: (803)349-2926