Modern technology and gadgets are fast arising nowadays. Gadgets is one of the best that has
been invented. Computers and laptops are one of these kinds. These gadgets are
very useful nowadays in giving information and also as a communication. But
despite of this, these gadgets may be infected by what we called “Virus”. What
is a virus by the way? Virus is a computer program that can copy itself and
spread from one computer to another without the permission of the owner. It
could damage our computers. There are so many kinds of viruses. Every kind of
these viruses has its own characteristics. Has its own way to infect other
files. One of these kinds is the ANNA KOURNIKOVA Virus. From the name itself, we never know that it
is one of the dangerous viruses arisen.
Last February
11, 2001, Jan de Wit, a Dutch programmer, authored a virus named Anna
Kournikova. It was designed to trick email users into opening a mail message
containing a picture of a Russian tennis player, Anna Kournikova. Many would
tempt to open this file because Anna Kournikova was famous and a very pretty
lady. But actually, it was hiding a malicious program. If the user was able to
open the program, the program plunders the address book of the Microsoft
Outlook e-mail program and attempts to send itself to all the people listed
there. The Kournikova virus tempts and would prompt a message “Hi. Check
this!”, and a picture with a file labeled “AnnaKournikova jpg.vbs”.
 |
| Russian tennis player, Anna Kournikova |
This would prompt out to trick you.
When launched under Microsoft Windows, the file
does not display a picture of Anna Kournikova but it would launch a viral
Visual Basic Script that forwards itself to everybody in the Microsoft Outlook
address book of the victim. It was created by using a simple and widely
available Visual Basic Worm Generator program designed by an Argentinian
programmer called “[K] Alamar”. The said virus had spread like a wildfire and
infected hundreds of thousands of computers world wide. Many businesses had
been affected by the time it was released. As a preventive measure said by the
anti virus vendors, they should shut down their email system to prevent from
being infected by the virus. But by the time the virus was released, Jan de Wit
turned himself to police.
Not
only Jan de Wit is doing this kind of activity. Even an ordinary people could be
one of this people. Every person has its own reason why they made this virus. They had their own purpose. I must say that Jan de Wit is gifted with
a great knowledge. But this great knowledge could be useful if he had used it
in a good way. Even though it wasn’t an intention, the consequences of it may
affect many people. We could get rid of
these viruses if we are very careful in reading emails or downloading files because we
might be a victim of this kind of virus. Viruses are like a disease that needs
an antidote in order to be cured. This
is the reason why people had to make what we called “Anti-virus”.
References :
http://news.cnet.com/2100-1001-252579.html
http://searchenterprisedesktop.techtarget.com/definition/Anna-Kournikova-virus
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Kournikova_(computer_virus)
References :
http://news.cnet.com/2100-1001-252579.html
http://searchenterprisedesktop.techtarget.com/definition/Anna-Kournikova-virus
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Kournikova_(computer_virus)
