Yasmine El-Rashidi looks at the 'Top 10 virus list', and asks if these viruses are really worth the hype In every arena of life and society, there has come to be a "Top 10 list". They range from the richest, smartest, or most beautiful people to the top 10 places to eat, vacation, or study; and they cross into the realm of top 10 most successful business people, companies and highest performing stocks. The information technology (IT) industry has top 10 lists of its own. This most infectious list seems to reproduce lists of its own. Literally, that is. It is the "Top 10 viruses list" released by global anti-virus company Sophos PLC -- an international leader renowned for having created the benchmark in virus lists. Back in November 2001 -- when the most recent list was released -- the Nimda virus took top honours, affecting approximately 27 per cent of all e-mails received by Internet users around the world. In the virus world, however, things grow fast, and now the Nimda virus, is a microbe of the past compared to the super viruses of today. Internet-related headlines announced everywhere last month that "Klez.H is the biggest virus ever". Klez.H, which affects one in every 300 e- mails, is rather clever. Unlike the infamous "Love Bug", or last summer's fling with "Sircam" -- both of which replicated themselves as they traveled around the world -- Klez.H replicates itself with a refined twist. It appears as different attachments and under different subject names, making it much more stealthy and therefore more lethal to computer systems. "Klez.H attacks Windows software, but bypasses Microsoft Outlook", Cable News Network (CNN) reported. "It is able to select random names from address books to use as the sender address, and also creates a large range of subject, text and attachment names." A vicious trick that has helped it worm its way around the world. "These elements", the CNN report continued, "have meant that the virus has been able to sustain high levels of activity over many weeks and not follow the usual peak and trough pattern that occurs in most outbreak situations". The outbreaks have become the stuff of day-to-day talk. In the last 10 months, 11,160 new viruses, worms and Trojan horses were reported figures indicative of the unyielding birth rate of these peculiar creations. In general, it is reported, there are about 40 new viruses a day and 1,200 every month. Of these, an estimated 30 or 40 break loose and go wild, wreaking havoc around the world. According to the anti-virus software company McAfee, a lot of the other viruses are a hoax. The McAfee Web site offers, as a clickable option, the "Virus Hoax List". The list includes hoaxes known as Mobile Phone, 48 Hours, A Virtual Card for You, AIDS, Disney, Pokeman, Friends, I Miss You, and so on. The hoax phenomenon has come to be known as "Virus Hype". Two months ago, the "JPEG" virus hit cyberworld. According to McAfee, the new computer villain used e-mail forwards with JPEG (a photo file format) attachments to release dangerous codes onto computer systems. A McAfee press release stated, "Potentially no file type could be safe". The virus, however, never became infectious, and probably stayed on just two hard drives: that of the creator, and that of a McAfee executive. It was, critics said, a sorry move for McAfee; attempting to pump up the hype in an effort to pump up the sales. Computer virus software -- which companies such as McAfee, Norton, and Symantec sell -- stands at between $30 to $50 a package. A well- sounded emergency alert is definitely enough to sky-rocket sales, as Nimda, Code Red, and the Love Bug proved when they made international headlines. "It's a marketing strategy that everyone uses," says Rania Ashour, a public relations and marketing executive at a Cairo-based multinational. "You convince the public that they need the product. It's very simple." It may be a very basic strategy, but it certainly works. The problem with exploiting this strategy for anti-virus software needs is that it works once, it works twice, but after 10 more times of being faced with a harmless virus that never leaves its home nest, people begin to doubt the cry of alert. In essence it becomes the cry "wolf". Companies such as McAfee, in situations such as the JPEG one, claim they are serving their public. "If we didn't do anything", they said about their alert signal for the expected JPEG epidemic, "somebody would have picked up the story somewhere down the line, and our customers would be asking us why we didn't tell them." The reason they sounded such an alert on a low-risk virus, they claimed, was to make the public aware that it was a new virus which could be a precursor of things to come. "It's hard to believe that a company like McAfee didn't know if the virus was going to be dangerous in the future or not," Karim Abdel-Aziz, a computer security systems specialist pursuing further studies in the US told Al- Ahram Weekly. "These people know exactly what they're talking about. They are experts. They have the best people working for them. It doesn't take too much to read the code and understand how a virus works." And then, of course, if they can understand the code, then surely they can decode and predict the magnitude or potential threat of a virus. "Probably. In most cases," he responds, "but they have to stay in business!" His critique is not the only one. On a popular Web site critical of the anti- virus industry -- www.vmyths.com -- George Smith, an editor at vmyths.com, recalls the big fuss made over 1992's "Michelangelo" virus that was expected to strike on the great Renaissance artist's birthday, 6 March. Michelangelo was expected to destroy data on millions of personal computers around the world. The next day, however, reported damage was strikingly low; and the virus had claimed relatively few victims. A similar pattern of media hype happened many years later, when the anti-virus industry itself introduced the Y2K scare to the world. The media, of course, loved it, and the entire world was glued to the news. "They have every right to try to sell their products," Abdel-Aziz says. "But they're doing it the wrong way. It has ceased being a marketing tool, and has crossed over to being a ploy." Anti-virus software is definitely important -- especially with presence of viruses that enter your system and attach X-rated text to outgoing e-mails. However, the hype is turning things upside down. It appears the public is now becoming blasé about the whole virus frenzy. "People have stopped reacting to these virus alerts," says Abdel-Aziz. "Most of my friends delete virus alerts forwarded to them without even reading them." And they also press the "cancel" button over and over when the little box appears on their computers informing them that their anti-virus software has expired and needs to be renewed. Aziz claims "the public has had enough... both here and in the States. There is a lot of scepticism about what the press says." One Cairo-based Internet user says fear of viruses has become a thing of the past. "I used to forward every forward I received," Hanan Mokhtar told the Weekly. "Now, khalas (no longer), I just delete them. Because nothing ever happened. It just got tedious after a while." Tedious hits home as the perfect word to describe a tired media strategy. "They hype things up," says Ashour. "It's the business side of the press." They transform everything into a pressing issue, and in the case of viruses, anti-virus companies are media's ideal partners. But the tactic is beginning to fall short. "People have developed a tolerance to all the virus alerts. They happen too often, and so the public can't keep up," states Abdel-Aziz. Instead, computer users shut-out the media and the constant alerts. If the anti-virus companies continue to worm their way into people's heads using the same tactics that they have in the past, then these companies, too, may be shut-out. They may ultimately be shut-out of the computer market by a tired and marketing-wary public. McAfee's virus detection and prevention tips 1. Do not open any files attached to an e-mail coming from an unknown, suspicious, or untrustworthy source. Some viruses can replicate themselves and spread via e-mail. 2. Do not open any files attached to an e-mail unless you know their content, even if the e-mail appears to come from a friend or someone you know. It's better to be safe than sorry and confirm the identity of the sender before opening a suspicious file. 3. Do not open any files attached to an e-mail if the subject line is questionable or unexpected. If opening the file is absolutely necessary, always save it to your hard drive beforehand. 4. Delete junk mail and chain e-mails. Do not forward or reply to them. They are considered spam: this is unsolicited, intrusive mail that clogs up the network. 5. Back up your files on a regular basis. This way, if a virus destroys your files, you can then replace them with a back-up copy. You should store this copy in a location separate from your work files -- preferably not on your computer. 6. Update your anti-virus software regularly. An estimated 1,200 viruses are discovered each month, so you'll want to protect your computer. These updates should at least cover the product's virus signature files. You may also need to update the product's scanning engine. 7. Check with your product vendors for updates which include those concerning your Web browser. For example, you can try http://www.microsoft.com/security. 8. Exercise caution in general when downloading any files from the Internet. Most importantly, never execute a file unless you are sure that the source is a legitimate and reputable one. Verify that an anti-virus programme checks the files on the download site. If in doubt, do not download the file, or else download it to a floppy disk, and test it with your own anti-virus software. 9. Check with http://www.mcafee.com if ever in doubt about a potential virus-related situation.
