The Nation - News from Jan. 11, 1988

A self-propagating computer program is spreading like an electronic “virus,” threatening to damage systems ranging from that at IBM’s regional headquarters in Tampa, Fla., to a computer club’s floppy discs. “It kind of creeps up on you,” said Jeff White, president of the Tampa Amiga User’s Group, whose membership was infiltrated by the small rogue program. Virus is computer jargon for a self-propagating set of orders devised by a saboteur and automatically copied from one computer disc to another, gradually taking up more and more memory space. At IBM, the virus took the form of an electronic chain letter that grew so large it slowed the company’s computerized message system.