🚀 go-pugleaf

In response to the following letter I received about the Proto-T virus in
PKZip 3.05, a gentleman from McAfee Assoc. sent the following response,
saying that PKZip 3.05 is a HACK, but no self-replicating virus is embedded
in it.  I have included the warning letter that he is refering to at the end
of this post for convenience.

-Jason Worley

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Date: Wed, 6 Jan 93 00:18:29 -0800
From: McAfee Associates <mcafee@netcom.com>
Message-Id: <9301060818.AA06457@netcom.netcom.com>
To: worley@a.cs.okstate.edu
Subject: Re: PKZip 3.05 VIRUS WARNING
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.misc
In-Reply-To: <1993Jan6.012822.14594@a.cs.okstate.edu>
References: <rdippold.726277941@cancun>
Organization: McAfee Associates
Cc:  


Hello Mr. Worley,

The "PROTO-T" virus is a hoax.  

If you carefully read the message about the virus, you'll note that it
says the virus infects video RAM, hard disk memory and modem buffers.

	When you change your video mode, you overwrite (clear) video 
RAM, so any code stored there would get erased.  Hard disk memory does 
not exist--unless one refers to caches on the hard disk itself or the
controller--which are not addressable by the CPU.  The same goes for
modem buffers.

	We have looked at numerous copies of the PKZ305.EXE cracked
version of PKZIP/UNZIP and not found any replicating (viral) code in
it.

	I would recommend that you ignore the message.

Regards,

Aryeh Goretsky
Technical Support
-- 
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McAfee Associates, Inc.  | Voice (408) 988-3832 | INTERNET:
3350 Scott Blvd, Bldg 14 | FAX   (408) 970-9727 | mcafee@netcom.COM
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Support for SENTRY/SCAN/NETSCAN/VSHIELD/CLEAN/WSCAN/NETSHIELD/TARGET/CONFIG MGR

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The following is the post Mr. Goretsky is refering to:
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     This is an exact copy of a "Broadcast" letter sent to all members and
affiliates of THIEVCO INC; a group located somewhere in the San Francisco Bay
Area. While I do not support the general theology of Thievco Inc, I must
applaud thier actions. Thier warnings about a new virus called PROTO-T, will
potentially save us computer users possibly thousands of dollars - and
hundreds of man hours.
     Here is a copy of the broadcast letter, as received from a friend
at Thievco ...

  <<*>>     <<*>>     <<*>>     <<*>>     <<*>>     <<*>>     <<*>>     <<*>>

Retrieved BLUWAV 6921 / THIEV 00621*420 - Node 1:8 Sent T-Tymnet

     Date    : 9/24/92 11:14pm
     To      : All Thievco Members, and affil.
     Re      : PROTO - T
     Class   : Confidential (go public 9-26)


     Dear Members,

     At 7:34PM (pst) our attempt to isolate and contain the PROTO - T
virus failed. As we have discovered, PROTO - T has a *VERY* unique
feature, to hide in the RAM of VGA cards, hard disks, and possibly,
in modem buffers. Unfortunaly, we found out the hard way - after it struck.
At this time, there is no known defence against this virus, save formatting
your hard/floppy disks - there isn't even a method of detecting it yet...
untill its too late. [ PROTO - T specs listed later ].
     Unearthly Vision ( Portland, Oregon ), and Chron ( Alameda, Calif )
were working on isolating the virus when it struck. Over 900 megabytes
of information was lost, of that about 214 megabytes is probably recoverable.

Action :

     Please assist us in implementing this plan, to warn the general public.
Our first priority is our fellow THIEVCO members. Please distribute this
letter to all contacts inside the U.S., upon recipt of this letter.
Please inform the public on 9-26-92. Start warning the elite boards first,
followed by the P.D. boards. Dont bother telling known SPA locals, they aren't
worth our time.

     Blue Boar - Distribute the warning in Southern California, start
with L.A. first.
     Chron     - Distribute to San Francisco, Sacramento, and south east coast.

     Garfield  - Distribute to Fido-Net, Vet-Net, Compuserve, and America
                 Online.

Unearthly Vision - Distribute to Oregon, and Washington.

 Executioner   - Distribute to San Jose, Monterey.


--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=

What is known:

   Proto - T was just a rumor, untill it was confirmed a few weeks ago.
Chron, being the most incredible skip-tracer, traced its origins to a
college campus in California. There, it was placed into two files.
The first, is a file called "TEMPLE" - which to our knowledge, has no
legitimate use; it seems to be a dummy file. The other file, was
placed in an unathorized version of PKZip by PKWare ( versions 3.0, and 3.1 -
these are not legitimate versions of PKZip! Quite possibly, these versions
of PKZip were created, for the reason of distributing PROTO - T ).

    Proto - T is very elusive. There is no program known to detect it.
From what we understand, it will only infect your system if certian
conditions are met. From what we know, it will infect your system only if
you run TEMPLE, or PKZip 3.x after 6:00pm. Even doing that wont nessaraly
cause infection - it took 6 days for Chron and Unearthly Vision to become
infected. Obviously some other criteria must be met.
    Upon infection, the virus is written (as un-attached file chains), On two
parts of a hard disk - each capable of running independently without the
other half.
    After infection, the virus seems to be written into the memory or memory
routines of a VGA or EGA monitor; or is written into the memory of the hard
drive, or quite possibly, into a modem - or COM port. Thus excaping most or
any known detection methods.

PROTO - T :

     Proto - T when activated, corrupts data on a disk, stops VGA or EGA
from being used ( Thus either defaulting to CGA, or locking up ), and
prohibits memory from being used over 512K.

Known to be put into two files : TEMPLE.EXE ( 14,771 Bytes ) and PKZip 3.x
(Varries always over 100,000 bytes when zipped). If you see these files -
do not get or use them.

Give this letter to all Thievco members and thier contacts, followed by
other boards.
With luck, we can stop the damage before it *REALLY* starts.

                                          THIEVCO INC, San Francisco Bay Area.


 Special Thanks for Chron, Unearthly Vision, and Blue Boar for all thier
help with this "Early warning" and tech help.