As
dreadful as may sound, computer viruses can be a nightmare that might cause extensive
damage to your innocent machine. It can significantly disrupt your system’s
performance and has the potential to wipe out everything on your hard disk.
Like cancer, pneumonia and other deadly diseases are to humans, computer
viruses are to computers. It is designed to persistently replicate itself and
corrupt your smart little baby making it sick and helpless. I don’t think
today, there is anybody, who can afford to loose the secrets they tell to their
dearest reliable friend or can endure to let some virus affect the system that
is so close to them. Those who have gone through a virus attack on their
computers knows too well what this fuss is all about and those who haven’t
should know about some of the most dangerous computer viruses and the destruction
they caused.
10.
Nimda –
Nimda
first surfaced in 2001 and hastily rosed to the top. The name of the virus is
derived from the word “Admin” spelled backwards. It just took 22 minutes for
this dangerous virus to propagate via four different ways – e-mail, server
vulnerabilities, shared folders and file transfer. The worm was released on
September 18, 2001, a week after the 9/11 attacks which forced many people to
believe that Nimda is a Cyber Terror attack as it quickly captured almost all
the sources via which the virus can infect maximum number of computers. Albeit,
the primary purpose of this virus was to slow down the internet traffic
considerably causing a denial-in-service attack.
9.
Conficker –
In 2009, a new computer worm
Conficker also known as Downup, Domnadup and Kido crawled its way into as many
as fifteen million Microsoft Windows operating systems around the world without
human intervention using a patched Windows flaw. Conficker virus is very
difficult to detect without running an upgraded version of original anti-virus
and malware scanner. It might spread via removable drives like hard disks,
smart phones and other thumb drives adding a corrupt file to it so that when
the device is attached to another computer, the AutoPlay dialog box display an
additional option. Conficker has assembled an army of zombies which has the
potential to steal financial data and other important information from your
system.
8.
Storm Worm –
The dreaded Storm Worm struck the
cyber world as a malicious Trojan horse program in late 2006 when users began
receiving e-mails with a subject line “230 dead as storm batters Europe.” It
was without a doubt one of the most sophisticated and greatest cyber fraud
networks ever constructed. It tricked the victims into clicking the fake links
in an e-mail that was infected by the virus which could easily turn any Windows
PC into a botnet, letting someone offsite operate it remotely for sending spam
mails across the internet. In January 2007, it was estimated that out of all
global malware infections, 8% is due to the Storm worm as the number of this
dangerous malware infected PCs was close to 10 million.
7.
CIH –
A
destructive parasitic virus CIH also known as “Chernobyl” was first emerged in
the year 1998 in Taiwan and quickly became one of the most dangerous and
destructive viruses to ever hit with a payload that corrupts data. The CIH
virus infects Windows 95 and 98 executable file and after doing that it remains
a resident in the machine’s memory, where it infects other executables. Once
activated, the virus annihilates the data on the hard disk and overwrites the
computer’s Flash BIOS chip, rendering it completely inoperable and unless the
chip is reprogrammed the user will not be able to boot the machine at all. Although
with increased awareness and advancement in technology the virus does not pose
a serious threat today but we can never forget the $250 million worth of
destruction it caused.
6.
Melissa –
Melissa
was the first mass-mailing macro virus for the new age of e-mailing which
became the breaking news across the world on March 26, 1999. The estimated
damage accounted to 300 to 600 million dollars after which FBI launched the
largest internet manhunt ever to catch the author of Melissa – David L. Smith
which of-course they did and after the arrest, he was sentenced 20 months in
federal prison and was ordered to pay a fine of $5000 for unleashing the
fastest virus of its time. The virus was distributed as an e-mail attachment
and when the attachment “list.doc” is clicked upon, the virus seeks for the
Microsoft Outlook address book to e-mail itself to the first 50 names on the
list with a message “Here is that document you asked for…don’t show anyone
else.
5.
SQL Slammer –
SQL
Slammer, a standalone malicious program also known as “Sapphire” appeared at
the starting of the year 2003 and was the first fileless worm which rapidly
infected more than 75000 vulnerable hosts within10 minutes on 25th
January. Through a classic denial of service attack, it dramatically slowed
down global internet traffic and brought down South Korea’s online capacity on
knees for 12 hours. Sapphire mainly targeted on the servers by generating
random IP addresses and discharging the worm to those IP addresses. The abrupt
release of infected network packets had a huge impact on the significant
services provided by Bank of America’s ATMs, Seattle’s 911 emergency response
systems and Continental airlines. All in all, the worm caused between $950
million and $1.2 billion in lost productivity which is not much compared to
what would have happened if it erupted on a week day and not on a Saturday.
4.
Code Red –
In
the summer 2001, a computer worm most commonly referred to as “Code Red” was
unleashed on the network servers on July 13. It was a very sneaky virus which
took advantage of a flaw in Microsoft Internet Information Server. This virus
was for the first time detected by two of the eEye Digital Security employees
and at the time when they found out about the virus, they were drinking Code
Red Mountain Dew; hence the name “Code Red.” The interesting thing about
this deadly virus is, it did not require you to open an e-mail attachment or
run a file; it simply needed an active internet connection with which it
defaces the webpage you open and display a text string “Hacked by
Chinese!” In less than a week “Code Red” brought down more than 400,000
servers including the White House web server. It’s estimated that the total
damage was of approximately $2.6 billion dollars with as many as one million
computers hit by the virus.
3.
Sobig F –
August
2003 turned out to be the miserable month for corporate and domestic computer
operators around the world as the sixth and most destructive deviant of Sobig
series hit the internet. Sobig F infected host computers by fooling the users
that the corrupt e-mail they received is from a legitimate source. If the user
opens the attachment it exposes a security hole in the system allowing the
intruder to send messages via the trapped user’s e-mail address. Within 24
hours, Sobig F set a record of replicating more than one million copies of
itself which later was broken by yet another mass mailer worm – My Doom.
However, Sobig F caused an extensive damage of $3 billion – $4 billion leaving
infections in over 2 million PCs worldwide.
2.
ILOVEYOU –
Back in 2000, one of the trickiest
computer malware ever was detected on May 4 in Philippines. Around 10% of the
internet users committed a huge mistake by going on the name of this hazardous
worm. The virus played on a radical human emotion of the need to be loved
because of which it became a global pandemic in only one night. The bug was
transmitted via e-mail having a subject line “ILOVEYOU” – a notion appealing to
many of us with an attached file to it which reads as –
Love-Letter-For-You.TXT.vbs. As soon as the file was opened, the virus took the
liberty of e-mailing itself to the first 50 contacts present in the Windows
address book and also infected the multimedia files saved in the system causing
damages that amounted to $5.5 billion.
1.
My Doom –
My
Doom explored its way to the malware world on 26th January 2004 and sent a
shockwave around the world as it scattered exponentially via e-mail with random
senders’ addresses and subject lines. My Doom also known as “Novarg” is
reported to be the most dangerous virus ever released, breaking the previous
record set by the Sobig F worm. My Doom swiftly infected some two million
computers and instigated a huge denial of service attack which smashed the
cyber world for sometime. It transmitted itself in a particularly deceitful
manner through e-mail as what receiver would first reckon to be a bounced error
message as it reads “Mail Transaction Failed.” But, as soon as the message is
clicked upon, the attachment is executed and the worm is transferred to e-mail
addresses found in user’s address book. The damage caused by this
fastest-spreading mass mailer worm was a whopping $38 billion.
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