

When viruses spread to BIOS, they can manipulate the commands - that’s the reason you might experience strange behavior from your mouse, keyboard, or speakers if your computer is infected. Viruses can, indeed, affect hardware when they reach the BIOS level. BIOS, or Basic Input Output System, is a set of codes that instruct a computer’s operating system (OS) how to interact with the hardware. To understand, you need to know what BIOS is. But, as you’ve probably guessed, that’s just a myth. There’s a popular rumor that computer viruses can make an infected device explode or cause physical damage to the device.

The unknown hacker who wrote the MyDoom virus was (or is) using infected devices as botnets to execute distributed denial-of-service attacks against many corporate websites, including Santa Cruz Operations ( SCO Group).Ĭomputer Virus Fact 7: Viruses Don’t Make Computers/Phones Explode When opened, it replicates itself and sends the same messages to everyone on the victim’s contact list.


MyDoom emails contain executable files or zip archives loaded with executable files. Some of these emails contain the message “andy I’m just doing my job, nothing personal, sorry.” Others masquerade as email delivery failure reports. Just like ILOVEYOU, MyDoom spreads via email. (We don’t have the latest information about its status in 2022.) According to Unit 42’s cybersecurity researchers and consultants, MyDoom was still active as of 2019, by which time it had caused estimated damages of $38 billion. Let’s focus on a well-known one in particular.Ī virus (or worm, remembering what we talked about earlier regarding worms vs viruses) named MyDoom, which first surfaced in 2004, is considered the fastest spreading virus in history. Computer Virus Fact 5: MyDoom Is the Fastest Spreading Virus in HistoryĪlright, we’re now half-way through our list of interesting facts about computer viruses.
