Conference hydra::amiga_v1

4445.0. "Byte Bandit" by XSTACY::PATTISON (A rolling stone gets the worm) Tue Jan 22 1991 05:10

    I've been an Amiga user for just a few weeks, and already I've been infected
    by the Byte Bandit virus.

    Fortunately, a friend donated a copy of VirusX, and although it put up a
    fight, I think I may have it under control. It looks like my Workbench disk
    was infected, which is what I imagine most users fear the most.

    What I'd like to know is.. What does Byte Bandit actually do, other than 
    spread? My disks showed a 'copy count' of over 700, meaning presumably that
    700 other disks were infected on the way.

    As far as I know, minimal damage was caused by the infection, in that any 
    files that I have 'lost' at any time don't seem to be as a result of it.
    
    At one point, I managed to infect the disk with VirusX on it. This proved
    disastrous, as 'curing' actually was 'spreading'. In the end, I loaded up
    my 'clean' workbench (write protected) and loaded VirusX into RAM:, after 
    which I could proceed safely.
    
    So.. Is Byte Bandit destructive? Or need I have worried about it at all?

    D���

	In answer to my own question....

	This virus was first spotted in note 1173.0, and there are more details
	in 1228.0; Now that I've read the latter, it does occur to me that, on
	occasion, some applications have 'frozen' on me.. I just put it down to
	a bug.

	On one occasion, the bootblock of a game disk was damaged also. Luckily
	I still had my store receipt and was able to change it. (Okay, so I was
	a little dishonest, but I did pay for the thing after all).

	The initial cause of my 'infection'? Well, I did get some disks from
	a friend containing miscellaneous things, like public domain software.
	I'm sure thats where it must have started, but I can't pin it down to
	a particular disk since so many were affected afterwards. Although
	a 'copy count' is recorded, disks are 're-infected' by the virus.

	I'd just like to say, thank goodness for Steve Hibbets' VirusX program.

	Dave