Paul Foley <paul@mycroft.actrix.gen.nz> writes:
4. Imitate the IBM Christmas exec. Break into someone's site and steal their mail aliases file. Now send mail to everyone on their alias list, pretending to be them, offering them a cute animation program they can install. The animation will happen, but it will also send mail to all THEIR aliases (like the Christmas exec) and (unlike that) install our malicious snooping software.
Another trojan horse.
I'd like to take an exception to this description of the XMAS EXEC, since I too received a copy of it in '87 (but had the smarts not to run it). It didn't break or steal anything. It did 2 things: * Displayed an ASCII Xmas tree; * E-mailed a copy of itself to every e-mail address listed in the database of e-mail aliases. VM/CMS comes a very convenient, standard, and user-friendly program for keeping track of nicknames, real names, and e-mail addresses, stored in a flat file with tags, which any REXX program can easily read. I had serious doubts that the person who wrote it was malicious. --- Dr. Dimitri Vulis Brighton Beach Boardwalk BBS, Forest Hills, N.Y.: +1-718-261-2013, 14.4Kbps