Talk:Computer worm

I removed the following section from Computer virus; it may fit better here:

Great loss by "worm"

On January 24, 2003, a kind of computer virus called a "worm" was released to infect the Internet. A worm is a series of computer instructions that makes copies of itself and sends it to other computers.

This worm sent copies of itself to computers across the Internet. The worm temporarily damaged millions of computers around the world. It slowed large groups of computers called networks.

Three servers defending the Internet crashed due to the worm.

One large American banking company had to close about 13,000 of its machines that let people get money from their bank. People could no longer get cash from the bank’s machines using their credit cards.

A large worldwide airline could not sell tickets using the Internet because the worm made its computers fail. Emergency service workers in the western American City of Seattle, Washington could not answer emergency calls because the worm caused their computers to fail.

Computer experts named the worm "W-Thirty-Two-Slammer". They said the worm caused a problem for the Internet that was similar to a traffic jam: when there are too many cars on a road in a large city, and no one can move. The Slammer worm caused an information jam.

The experts believe the worm was first created in Asia. An American computer expert said evidence seemed to show the virus first appeared in Hong Kong. A government computer team in Hong Kong is working to find who released the new virus.

South Korea may have been the worst hurt nation in the January 24th attack. On January 27th, a spokesman for South Korea’s Information and Communication Ministry said computer communications on the Internet were almost back to normal. The ministry also said experts were working to find from where the computer virus came.

Computer experts in China and Taiwan also reported problems with the worm. Computers in Japan suffered some problems, but they were limited to a few schools and companies.

By the morning of January 28, computer experts around the world had stopped the worm or made their computer systems safe against the Slammer. Experts believe the worm cost computer networks many millions of dollars in delays, lost business, and the loss of work usually done on a computer.

The person who wrote the instructions that created the Slammer worm attacked computers that use the Microsoft's computer operating system. Microsoft quickly provided the necessary computer instructions to make its system safe and prevent the Slammer worm from attacking other computers.

The kind of program that made the Microsoft system safe is called a "patch" or "update". Microsoft says it wants to improve the speed of future updates or patches for computer users linked to the Internet, keeping harm from their products.

Computer experts say the Internet has become extremely important every day in every area of the world. They say businesses, local governments and private citizens everywhere are using the Internet as an important part of their business or daily life. The experts say some businesses could no longer exist without the Internet. However, many businesses, local governments and private citizens have failed to learn how to protect their computers from viruses or worm attacks. --Eptalon (talk) 14:20, 14 January 2011 (UTC)