Sticky Virus

Virus Name: Sticky Aliases: Multi-2, Nu Way V Status: Common Discovered: May, 1992 Symptoms: .COM & .EXE growth; Master boot sector altered; decrease in total system & available free memory Origin: Unknown Eff Length: 927 - 1,407 Bytes Type Code: PRtAKX - Parasitic Resident .COM, .EXE, Overlay, and Master Boot Sector Infector Detection Method: ViruScan, AVTK, IBMAV, NAV, F-Prot, PCScan, Sweep, NAVDX, VAlert, ChAV, NShld, LProt, Sweep/N, Innoc, AVTK/N, IBMAV/N, NProt, NAV/N Removal Instructions: Delete infected files General Comments: The Sticky, or Multi-2, virus was discovered at several sites in the United States and Canada in May, 1992. Sticky is a memory resident multi-partite virus which infects the hard disk master boot sector (partition table) and all executable files. When the first Sticky infected program is executed, the Sticky virus will infect the system hard disk's master boot sector. This virus writes a copy of its viral code to Side 0, Cylinder 0, Sectors 2 and 3, and then alters the master boot sector to point to this code. The Sticky virus does not become memory resident at this time, and will not infect files. Later, when the system user boots from the Sticky virus infected hard disk, the Sticky virus will become memory resident above the top of system memory but below the 640K DOS boundary. Interrupt 12's return will be moved. Total system and available free memory, as indicated by the DOS CHKDSK program, will have decreased by 3,072 bytes. Interrupt 21 will be hooked by Sticky in memory. Once the Sticky virus is memory resident, it will infect any executable program which is opened or executed. Infected .COM programs will have a file length increase of 927 bytes. .EXE programs will increase in size by 1,133 to 1,407 bytes. In both cases, the virus will be located at the end of the file. The program's date and time in the DOS disk directory listing will not be altered. Sticky is an encrypted virus, and no text strings are visible within the viral code in infected programs. It is unknown what Sticky does besides replicate.