Think of the Morris worm as the grandfather of every single worm out there. Many more may exist, but they just haven't been formally named quite yet. You might notice sluggish performance, or your computer could go down altogether. When infected by a worm, your computer works overtime to send out more copies. Click on even one, and the program begins to run. Someone gives you a storage stick, and every file on it is infected. Your computer starts sending out more copies of the worm via email. You get a note from someone you trust, and it comes with an attachment it encourages you to click.

You wouldn't know anything was wrong until your computer started acting up. You'd pop the disk into your computer, and the program would run in the background. Years ago, hackers spread these worms via floppy disks and other types of storage. A worm targets vulnerabilities in operating systems.Īttackers have used worms to deliver some of the most destructive forms of malware, including ransomware programs that encrypt all the files on a server. But it's critical to your performance, and you can't turn it off.

This program runs in the background, and you may never notice how it works or what it does. How do worms work?Įvery computer needs an operating system. Let's dig into how worms work, and then we'll unpack how the Morris worm got its name and how it continues to impact modern programming. And it made thousands of people deeply suspicious of the information we store and share online.

Modern hackers still use worms, and they can be devastating. Modern, well-defended computers are immune to the vulnerabilities the hacker exploited.īut even so, the worm inspired generations of hackers. A hacker launched the Morris worm in 1988, and many people consider it one of the very first public attacks on computer systems.

How does worm virus work