4 ms·

> mostly via floppy disk sharing as the world wide web didn't exist yet Great post, but wouldn't the internet, email, BBS and other networks have been the main

> mostly via floppy disk sharing as the world wide web didn't exist yet Great post, but wouldn't the internet, email, BBS and other networks have been the main cause of its worldwide spread?

sehugg 11y ago
In 1987 sneakernet was way more popular than any online service. The majority of regular folks weren't online yet.
- tclancy 11y ago
  And some of us who were were still rocking a Commodore. 30+ years, still 0 infections here!
  - digi_owl 11y ago
    Reminds me that Woz claimed that one reason the early Macs were so resistant to viruses was that most of the OS lived in ROM.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
luso_brazilian 11y ago
As the initial source of infection in a certain geographical area maybe but as far as I remember most viruses (specially boot sector ones) spread through floppy disk sharing, first from people to people inside companies, from company computer to personal computer at home, from friend to friend personal computer and then from personal computer to company computer. Much like the spread of HIV back in the late 80's and early 90's most people didn't really understand how exactly computers programs worked and didn't follow IT guidelines on how to avoid getting infected. The number of infections was naturally limited by the small number of people at risk: computer users. But as the availability of computers and the number of useful applications increased so did the volume of infections being spread through the same bad habits: floppy sharing without protection, and by that I mean the read only lock. And, instead of the ideal (but very hard) way to eradicate the problem (informatic prophylaxis and education for users) the industry "solved" the problem by creating the antivirus and accepting an occasional infection as something unavoidable. Then the World Wide Web exploded, creating a frictionless media for the spread of these infections and here we are.
- hartpuff 11y ago
  Thanks. Yeah, I think I was overestimating usage of online file transfer systems at that time, and underestimating offline/business usage of PCs.

> mostly via floppy disk sharing as the world wide web didn't exist yet Great post, but wouldn't the internet, email, BBS and other networks have been the main cause of its worldwide spread?

sehugg 11y ago

In 1987 sneakernet was way more popular than any online service. The majority of regular folks weren't online yet.

tclancy 11y ago
And some of us who were were still rocking a Commodore. 30+ years, still 0 infections here!
- digi_owl 11y ago
  Reminds me that Woz claimed that one reason the early Macs were so resistant to viruses was that most of the OS lived in ROM.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]

luso_brazilian 11y ago

As the initial source of infection in a certain geographical area maybe but as far as I remember most viruses (specially boot sector ones) spread through floppy disk sharing, first from people to people inside companies, from company computer to personal computer at home, from friend to friend personal computer and then from personal computer to company computer. Much like the spread of HIV back in the late 80's and early 90's most people didn't really understand how exactly computers programs worked and didn't follow IT guidelines on how to avoid getting infected. The number of infections was naturally limited by the small number of people at risk: computer users. But as the availability of computers and the number of useful applications increased so did the volume of infections being spread through the same bad habits: floppy sharing without protection, and by that I mean the read only lock. And, instead of the ideal (but very hard) way to eradicate the problem (informatic prophylaxis and education for users) the industry "solved" the problem by creating the antivirus and accepting an occasional infection as something unavoidable. Then the World Wide Web exploded, creating a frictionless media for the spread of these infections and here we are.

hartpuff 11y ago
Thanks. Yeah, I think I was overestimating usage of online file transfer systems at that time, and underestimating offline/business usage of PCs.