Macro Computer Viruses Surge

BURLINGTON, MASS., Apr. 15, 1996
The world's first macro computer virus is about to become the biggest virus threat to computer users worldwide.

Concept accounted for 20 percent of all calls for help to S&S Software International Inc., maker of DR SOLOMON'S ANTI-VIRUS TOOLKIT, in the first quarter of 1996. Only "Empire.Monkey" generated more calls -- 26.2 percent -- to S&S for help. Concept, the first macro virus, first appeared in August 1995. It spread worldwide by early September. The spread of Concept from computer to computer in just under nine months is extraordinarily rapid. At the end of 1995, when S&S reported a 23 percent increase in viruses to a year-end total of 7,400 Concept just missed making the list of 10 most prevalent viruses for the full year.

Anti-virus researchers at S&S also report the of six new macro viruses during January, February and March 1996:

Atom, which deletes all files in the current directory on December 13. Also, if the seconds field of the current time is 13, Atom encrypts a document as it is saved.

Green Stripe, the first macro virus to target the Lotus word processors, Ami Pro and Word Pro. Green Stripe changes the spelling of "its" in the document to "its."

Hot, which erases the contents of a document when activated.

Imposter, apparently a variant of Concept with the message "just to prove another point." It pretends to be the DMV macro virus, renaming the AutoClose macro in Normal.dot to "DMV" when it infects a new document.

Polite, which asks the user before infecting new documents.

Xenixos, which affects the German-language version of Microsoft Word and, like Atom, encrypts documents.