Computer Contagion

I admit it: Despite all warnings, without even realizing the classic signs of the nasty binary bugs we call computer viruses, I opened an attachment to an e-mail message that came unexpectedly and without text. My computer bleeped at me and a deranged ladybug appeared to announce: "You are infected with MTX.gen!"

What the hell, I thought, is MTX.gen?

At that particular moment, I can now tell you, I joined an increasing number of Harvard students who have recently found themselves afflicted by malicious computer programs. Computer viruses, worms and trojans have been spreading across the Internet and the campus with ever-increasing speed, especially as e-mail becomes the default method of communication. Even worse, each generation of virus seems to be causing an increasing amount of damage in more and more places across the world. The ILOVEYOU virus that gained so much notoriety this summer, for example, caused an estimated $7 billion in damages and struck from Manila to Missouri. (To put that in perspective, if you were given a dollar every second for 100 years, you wouldn't have half the amount of damages caused by this one technological expression of malice.) With the rise of such devastating computer contagion, I thought it important to understand what viruses can do, why they are so effective and ultimately how computer users--and Harvard students--can protect against them.

Trust in a system that most of us do not understand and in people we have never seen is a first principle of the Information Age; we just assume that an e-mail, for example, is an uncontaminated communication from its author. The Internet would not exist without this underlying belief, but as in any community there are those who take advantage of tears in the fabric for their own benefit or self-expression and those who try to protect themselves against such opportunists. E-mail, despite what we may think about it, demonstrates both sides of this: On the one hand, viruses can append themselves to outgoing e-mails to infect other computers; on the other, it can be imperceptibly scanned after it leaves the author's computer. This assumption of trust is the virus programmer's window of opportunity to do any number of nasty things.

The diversity of approaches to causing this damage is quite frightening: Viruses come in all sorts of shapes and sizes and affect files in any number of different ways. There are viruses that are called when the computer boots up each time and viruses that specifically attack certain programs like Microsoft Word. There are viruses for Macintoshes, Windows and Unix machines, as well as viruses for Palm Pilots and other hand-held computers. In a way oddly analogous to nuclear weapons, a virus' potential for damage is measured by its payload--exactly what it does--and its distribution. The ILOVEYOU virus, for example, was very dangerous because it was easily communicable through e-mail and caused an enormous amount of damage once it was on a machine.

The ILOVEYOU virus, as well as the MTX.gen file that is currently causing a great deal of grief on this campus, represent a new step in the evolution of computer parasites. These programs are known as worms, programs that insidiously spread from one computer to another with very little human intervention. The ILOVEYOU virus stole passwords and credit card numbers; the MTX virus, on the other hand, destroys files and prevents a user from accessing certain websites. Even more dangerous than such worms, possibly, are Trojans. These virus-type programs allow someone else access to your computer. Once they're loaded on, the hacker can do almost anything with your system, from using it to hack other systems to opening new files from anywhere they choose to be. In the words of former Crimson editor Kevin S. Davis '96, Director of Residential Computing at Harvard, "If your computer starts acting like it's possessed--mouse randomly moving, messages appearing on the screen, CD popping open, that sort of thing--chances are you have a Trojan." In short, if your computer starts acting like Keanu Reaves' in The Matrix, call a User Assistant.

The prevalence of viruses will probably only increase with time, especially as it becomes easier and easier to program them to perform all sorts of tasks. Perhaps the best way to protect against them is to--unlike me--actually follow the advice that most people give. Important files should be backed up and e-mail attachments shouldn't be opened until they're scanned. Avoid files with extensions that are unfamiliar, and most importantly if you're not expecting any attachments, don't open any files. Harvard makes it remarkably easy for us to do this through Pine, as well as offering us some decent anti-virus software. In addition to running that program often, it's also vital that it's updated regularly to protect against new incarnations of viruses. Viruses may very well change the nature of the Internet in the next few years by challenging the trust that underlies it and allows it to grow. Hopefully, a few preventative measures on all our parts can avoid that loss of faith in the Internet community and save us all a lot of grief.

Rohan R. Gulrajani '02 is an engineering concentrator in Leverett House. His column appears on alternate Mondays.