Viruses are created by a wide range of people for a number of different reasons, Holder said. Some were created to show vulnerabilities that existed in different computer systems, so people could have fix actions if they ever occurred. Others were created to do damage and destroy computer systems. Twenty-three Air Force commands reported 896 viruses in 1996. Those virus incidents affected 4,414 computer systems with 7,950 man-hours lost.
Viruses can enter a computer system in a number of ways.
One of the most common is a disk from home. Viruses can pass easily from disk to computer. The best thing to do is check any disk received for viruses before you open any documents, Holder said. E-mail and the Internet use are two of the common carriers of viruses inside computer systems. When most people receive e-mail or log on the Internet, they don't know that viruses can travel through these systems with ease and be transferred to their computer system, Holder said.