Alpha-743 Virus

Virus Name: Alpha-743 Aliases: V Status: Rare Discovery: March, 1993 Symptoms: .COM file growth; system hangs Origin: Unknown Eff Length: 743 Bytes Type Code: PNCK - Parasitic Non-Resident .COM Infector Detection Method: Sweep, AVTK, ViruScan, F-Prot, IBMAV, NAV, NAVDX, VAlert, PCScan, ChAV, Sweep/N, NShld, NProt, AVTK/N, Innoc, NAV/N, IBMAV/N, LProt Removal Instructions: Delete infected files General Comments: The Alpha-743 virus was submitted in March, 1993. Its origin or point of isolation is unknown. Alpha-743 is a non-resident, direct action infector of .COM programs, including COMMAND.COM. When a program infected with the Alpha-743 virus is executed, the Alpha-743 virus will infect one .COM program located in the current directory. If an uninfected .COM program does not exist in this directory, a system hang will occur with the virus accessing the current drive. Programs infected with the Alpha-743 virus will have a file length increase of 743 bytes with the virus being located at the end of the file. The program's date and time in the DOS disk directory listing will not be altered. The following text string is encrypted within the viral code in Alpha-743 infected files: "*.com *.*"