Mugshot Virus
Virus Name: Mugshot
Aliases:
V Status: Rare
Discovered: August, 1992
Symptoms: BSC; system boot failures
Origin: India
Eff Length: N/A
Type Code: BR - Resident Boot Sector Infector
Detection Method: AVTK, ViruScan, IBMAV, F-Prot,
Sweep, NAV, NAVDX, VAlert, PCScan, ChAV
Removal Instructions: DOS SYS on infected system diskettes
General Comments:
The Mugshot virus was received in August, 1992. It is originally
from India. Mugshot is a memory resident infector of diskette boot
sectors.
When the system is booted from a diskette whose boot sector is
infected with the Mugshot virus, the Mugshot virus will become
memory resident. At this point, the boot process will usually
fail. When the user then replaces the boot diskette, the newly
inserted diskette will become infected if it is not write
protected. The boot will still not complete.
Mugshot infected diskettes will have the following text strings
located within the viral code in the diskette boot sector:
"Ref:vb. Greetings from Anil Rao!(snapé__ with graphics
program) This prog is aimed at developping permanent vaccines
forvirusesThis program is harmless it doesnt destroy data.,
affects only a:,b: drives.For info. contact Anil Rao.
Bombay, India."
The Mugshot will have moved the original boot sector to another
location on the disk, where it will be immediately followed by
several sectors of additional virus code. These additional
sectors will include the following additional text strings:
"For every vaccine thereis a virus"
".Do no pla"
Mugshot is a poor replicator, we were unable to successfully
boot the system from any infected diskettes, though we were
able to replicate the virus.