What Is The First Computer Virus In Philippines

General
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What Is The First Computer Virus In Philippines

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What Is The First Computer Virus In Philippines?

Answer:

The first computer virus to emerge from the Philippines and gain widespread notoriety is the ILOVEYOU virus, also known as the “Love Bug” or “Love Letter” virus.

Background and Impact:

  1. Creation:

    • Developed by Onel de Guzman, a student from the Philippines, and released on May 4, 2000.

  2. Mechanism:

    • The virus spread through email, posing as a love confession with the subject line “ILOVEYOU” and an attachment titled “LOVE-LETTER-FOR-YOU.txt.vbs”.
    • When the attachment was opened, it executed a script that overwrote files and replicated by sending itself to contacts in the victim’s address book.

  3. Global Impact:

    • It infected millions of computers worldwide within hours of its release.
    • Caused an estimated $5.5 to $8.7 billion in damages and productivity losses.
    • Targeted Microsoft’s Outlook and relied on a combination of social engineering and scripting vulnerabilities.

  4. Consequences and Legal Aspects:

    • The incident exposed weaknesses in global cybersecurity practices during that time.
    • Onel de Guzman was not prosecuted due to the absence of laws against malware creation in the Philippines at the time.

The ILOVEYOU virus remains one of the most notorious and impactful computer viruses, marking a significant moment in cybersecurity history.