Virus Question

[kyleboy77]

Is there any type of virus that could destroy my computer's... I'm just wondering

 

[pranks7er]

and why do you want to know about such a virus?

 

[su root]

Is there any type of virus that could destroy my computer's... I'm just wondering

Destroy them how? Physically? There are some old ones that may still work, but it's very unlikely that you'll catch one like that. If you mean just mess up your OS install or something, then yeah, lots of them.

You can do more virus research here:
http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/vinfodb.html

 

[amazon10x]

I suppose a virus could change your refresh rate on your monitor too high and waste that and I believe it is possible for it to edit your BIOS and overclock your CPU at ungodly speeds and burn it to pieces. But I haven't heard of any viruses that can do that.

 

[kyleboy77]

I was just wondering If such a virus existed

 

[XWRed1]

Any modern monitor should be safe from death-by-refresh.

Overclocking maybe... but that'd be specific to a motherboard, and even then, the computer would probably lock and fail to run long before it'd cook itself.

 

[mbentley]

for the most part, there are no viruses that can cause any more physical damage than normal wear and tear... i know there used to be a virus that could damage hard drives where it would cause the read head to slam back and forth, causing it to break eventually, but that has been long since blocked as a way of attack...

 

[Crash893]

isnt there a type that F's the bios

doesnt really ruin anything but its a pain in the but to get a new bios chip

 

[su root]

isnt there a type that F's the bios

doesnt really ruin anything but its a pain in the but to get a new bios chip

In the old days, there were viruses like that, but nowadays, flashing is too vendor-specific. Besides, viruses nowadays tend to look for # of infections as a goal, and not necessarily the amount damage caused... who hears about a virus that formats 300 people's harddrives vs. something like blaster?

 

[Crash893]

yea but the question is " is there" not how popular it is

although you bring up an intresting point

the way i see it there is more of a shift from computer based virus's to the interent based worms that exploite things that everyone has in comon like security holes in windows.