If I personally know 20 people that got the virus, I can t even imagine how many across campus have gotten it, Catlin said. There were not any immediate indications of the virus because it was not yet active, according to Henderson. This virus tries to infect a file which is used to open applications, Henderson said. If this file is open, it cannot write to it, so it creates another file. After the file is corrupt, it waits for a specific event to occur before it becomes active, according to Henderson.
Every virus is triggered by certain events.
This specific virus is triggered by the 59 minute of the hour, Henderson said. This virus is also a worm virus, an internet virus that attaches to email messages. It infects machines so that any mail message sent out has the virus attached to it. Fortunately, Henderson said the computers could be fixed, often with the help of the student workers. Some viruses will wipe out files, some wipe out entire hard drives and some send themselves from the address books, but not this one.