Worms and Trojan Horses

A worm is a program than can make copies of itself from one disk drive to another. It is self contained and can also spread by copying itself using email or another form of transport. Worms can compromise the security systems of computers and can cause damage in the process. Worms sent via email usually comes in the form of a joke program or some type of software. They can cause thousands of dollars in damages. A worm would be a weapon of choice for an electronic attack that could cause widespread economic damage by disrupting and or destroying a large fraction of computers responsible for day to day business said Nicholas Weaver and Vern Paxson, two security researchers who worked on a project “Worst-Case Worm Attacks,” in collaboration with the International Computer Science Institute (ICSI) a non profit research group associated with the University of California at Berkley in 2004.
Trojan horses are programs known to have benign capabilities. It neither replicates nor copies itself, but can cause damage and or compromise the security system of a computer. Trojan horses are usually sent by individuals in the forms of email. Like the worm it is usually in the form of a joke or a software program. Some tasks that are performed by Trojan worms includes opening an internet connection that allows an outsider to gain access to information and files on the user’s computer without the user’s knowledge. Looking for passwords or confidential information stored on the computer and emailing them o the attackers address.
In life many make decisions without thinking of the repercussions. Morally it is wrong to release a worm regardless of the fact that it may be harmless or not. It may not necessarily crash a system but may slow it down for a day or two causing delays and draw backs to the many that it affects. What started out as an experiment in the head of Morris to show the glitches in Uniex operating system, turned out to be a national disaster. Based on

References: Michael J.Quinn (Fourth Edition) Ethics for the Information Age A worm is a self-contained program Pg 306 The internet worm and background of Robert Tappan Morris Jr Pg 310, 311 Ethical Evaluation and Utilitarian Evaluation Pg 312 Trojan horse is with benign capabilities Pg 313 Gregg Keizer Techweb News June 2004. http://www.informationweek.com/worst-caseworms.com Research work done by Nicholas Weaver & Vern Paxon two security researches who worked in collaboration with ICSI and University of California at Berkley NC State University http://ethics.csc.ncsu.edu/abuse/wvt/ A worm is a program than can make copies of itself from one disk drive to another. Trojan horses neither replicates nor copies itself.