What an incredible way to conceptualize and compare computer versus biological viruses (with the size of them in bits looking reasonably similar). In the virus

What an incredible way to conceptualize and compare computer versus biological viruses (with the size of them in bits looking reasonably similar). In the virus writing scene there are a number of trends that have allowed generic approaches to outsmart even incredibly complex "virus scanners": 1. polymorphic code - basically you keep the Turing Machine / Program Logic the same, but you use random widgets with random side effects to implement the program logic. In this case each instance of the virus is different per infected host and there are no reliable signatures based on the bits to recognize them. 2. Packers - basically a program that on its own is not malicious but can carry another compressed and encrypted program that it will "unpack" in memory and then execute - allowing a virus to ride through virus scanning. 3. Stagers - A small and otherwise innocuous piece of code that pulls commands in either real time or as needed from the network, keeping all program logic in memory, and executing malicious code that is never packed into a formal executable file (and thus never scanned by anti-virus). These have the advantage that they are basically impossible to forensically debug because the attacker will change or turn off the payload after the stager succeeds the first time. Has nature found a way to emulate any of these creative methods for bypassing immune systems? I remember hearing that HIV can look innocuous to an immune system, but I'm not sure that's because it uses a technique like the above.