First Known Virus -- On a MAC?!?

[bobber205]

I was walking along the halls of the computer science major in my awesome tech college when I happened to notice a tech poster. On that I read the first known virus was a simpe one spread on Apple II floppies whose only purpose was to display a simpe rhythm (hard word to spell) before startup...

Is this BS?

 

[WildCowboy]

Yes...that would be Elk Cloner.

 

[balamw]

FWIW the Apple ][ was no Mac.

B

 

[dpaanlka]

The Apple II is not a Mac, but this sort of virus was quite common on Macs before Mac OS X. They would cause beeps at random times, etc...

You can download a utility from my website that will find and remove many of these pesky little guys, but it only works if your computer can boot in the Mac OS 9 or below. It will not work in Classic Mode under OS X.

 

[imacintel]

Creepy dude.

 

[Killyp]

Would make sense. Apple computers were the first commercially available computers which had networking built in...

 

[balamw]

Would make sense. Apple computers were the first commercially available computers which had networking built in...

It's an Apple ][ "virus". The main network available back then was floppy sneakernet as we had only just come out of using cassette tapes.

B

 

[risc]

...The main network available back then was floppy sneakernet...

Ah... the good old days!