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F-Secure Hoax Information Pages: Meme
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Summary
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| Meme is not a virus. This is supposed to be a joke, but as we have seen in the past several times, hoaxes like this just cause panic and grief. |
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Detailed Description
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There is no real 'MEME' or 'anti-CDA' virus.
Here is the the original hoax warning message:
Subject: New anti-CDA virus threatens Internet
Newsgroups: comp.security.misc,comp.security.unix,alt.security,
alt.comp.virus,alt.folklore.computers
Date: Tue, 5 Mar 1996 01:30:39 GMT
As part of their vicious opposition to the Communications Decency
Act, hackers have created a devilish new virus the sole purpose of
which is to oppose the CDA. This virus is now spreading over the
Internet.
According to experts, most viruses are specific to particular types
of computers, because they insert themselves into "machine code"
that only works on one type of computer. However, the recent Word
Macro virus showed that some viruses can cross the boundaries
between computer types.
The new anti-CDA virus is in that category. It is a so-called "meme
virus" that propagates through insertion in the files that users
create to automatically sign their e-mail and Usenet articles. Once
the virus is in the file, it is automatically attached to all the
user's outgoing communications, spreading its politically extreme
message with the terrifying exponential efficiency of biological
reproduction.
Technology has been advancing at such a rapid rate that, incredibly,
the creation of a virus of this type has not yet become a criminal
act. This is yet another example of the threat that an unregulated
Internet can pose to a carefully-controlled and properly-constrained
democracy. In the words of Anal Roberts, an advocate of regulations
like the CDA, "if Jesus didn't need the Internet, then neither do
we".
Users who wish to avoid encountering this virus can do so by staying
off the Internet for the next 2 weeks, as this particular virus will
become inert after that.
--
Will Mengarini
Visit on or before Fr 15 Mar 96 to become
a plaintiff in the lawsuit against the Communications Decency Act.
Include this paragraph as a meme virus in your .sig until then.
Please do not forward it around. |
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F-Secure Corporation |
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Last Modified: January 01, 2006
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