Vico Virus

Virus Name: Vico Aliases: Vico.500 V Status: New Discovered: January, 1995 Symptoms: .COM file growth; decrease in available free memory; file date/time decade = "2" Origin: Unknown Eff Length: 500 Bytes Type Code: PRhCK - Parasitic Resident .COM Infector Detection Method: F-Prot, AVTK, Sweep, ViruScan, NAVDX, VAlert, NAV, IBMAV, ChAV, NProt, AVTK/N, Sweep/N, NShld, NAV/N, IBMAV/N, Innoc 4.0+ Removal Instructions: Delete infected files General Comments: The Vico virus was received in January, 1995. Its origin or point of isolation is unknown. Vico is a memory resident infector of .COM files, including COMMAND.COM. When the first Vico infected program is executed, this virus will install itself memory resident at the top of system memory but below the 640K DOS boundary. Available free memory, as indicated by the DOS CHKDSK program from DOS 5.0, will have decreased by approximately 512 bytes. Interrupts 15 and 21 will be hooked by the virus in memory. Once the Vico virus is memory resident, it will infect .COM files, including COMMAND.COM, when they are executed. Infected .COM files will have a file length increase of 500 bytes with the virus being located at the end of the file. The program's date in the DOS disk directory will have been set to "2" with the remainder of the date and time being unaltered. The following text string is visible within the viral code in all infected files: "Hello! I`m Wirus VICO" It is unknown what the Vico virus may do besides replicate.