Truth About Computer Security Hysteria

HomePage virus/worm (May 2001 hysteria)

A HomePage worm/virus generated media attention and user hysteria when it surfaced in early May 2001. Reporters seemed infatuated with it because it sends the user to pornography sites — and they rushed to press with quotes from wolf-crying virus experts who made dire predictions.

"Conrad Simpson, Managing Director of Celare Limited expects this virus to spread faster than any of its predecessors," UTV declared. ZDNet and Computerworld quoted Mikko Hypponen (F-Secure): "early propagation reports indicate that this virus is spreading faster than many of the biggest viruses we saw last year." IDG quoted Marius Van Oers (Network Associates), who insisted "we have received a great number of reports of infections... These are almost Loveletter proportions." And the list goes on...

However, reporters quickly abandoned the story when HomePage failed to live up to virus experts' dire predictions.

The media may no longer remember anything about this virus, but Symantec's website still reported HomePage on 14 May 2001 as a "Category 4 (Severe)" threat. The company defines it as a "dangerous threat type, difficult to contain," with severe levels of global infection and high levels of damage/distribution. Symantec urges every user on the planet to update their antivirus software "immediately."

Some antivirus products needed no update because they could detect HomePage generically. Other antivirus products failed to protect users until they obtained a software patch. Vmyths.com explained last year how to automatically detect this brand-new virus. Just read this page and replace every occurence of ILoveYou with HomePage. It's that simple. We hate to say "we told you so," but, uh... we told you so.

Last updated: 2001/5/14