The First Virus …

Malware — viruses, worms, Trojan horses and the like — has been around about as long as the first networked computers. In fact, 2011 is the 40th anniversary of the first known computer virus, a laboratory experiment that didn’t cause damage but proved to be a harbinger of the risks to come. Here is a brief timeline showing some of the milestones in the history of computer mischief.

1971: Creeper

The first known virus-like program was written by an employee of a Cambridge, Mass., company that built part of Arpanet, the predecessor to the Internet. The program was a lab test to see whether it was possible to create a self-replicating bit of software.

1982: Elk Cloner

A junior-high student came up with the first self-propagating program released outside the lab. The program spread via floppy disks on old Apple II computers — displaying a short poem on infected machines.

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