Viruses slow down network
By John Ashley Menzies
Staff Reporter

As Kyle Lester sat at his computer Monday, he watched his Internet disconnect every 45 seconds or so because of the virus known as Blaster.

“It was annoying,” said Lester, a sophomore psychology major. “I couldn’t get onto the Net and I wasted two or three hours trying to clear it off my computer.”

According to an article on CNN.com, a trio of major viruses known as the Blaster, SoBig and Welchia worms infected over 500,000 computers in the past week alone.

A “worm” is defined as any type of virus that infects computers, but generally does so by sending e-mails through the victim’s address book or by open channels or ports on a network, according to the Web site.

Associate Provost of Information Services David Edmondson said this is the third version of the Blaster virus, which is the virus causing the most problems.

Generally, once a patch is made the virus is no longer a threat because the virus protection programs get smarter, but this particular virus continues to get smarter after each patch is made, Edmondson said.

“This will probably continue until someone just gives up,” Edmondson said. “In the meantime, we are going to get all the machines patched.”

As new and old students begin to arrive on campus, a vast majority of them will have a personal computer and Information Services is worried that the bug will be on their computer and, when hooked up to the network, spread from there, Edmondson said.

As soon as a connection to the network is made, the virus begins connecting to other computers on the network and spreading, and the cycle then repeats itself again, said Billy Farmer, a computer science professor. The constant connections and communications between computers overloads the network, causing it to slow down, he said.

“It is the virus causing the huge amount of traffic that has the network on its knees,” Farmer said.

Edmondson said Information Services plans to handle these problems as they come up. He said that all hall directors have been given a CD that will disinfect the computers and patch the problem.

Microsoft Windows versions 2000 and XP have a vulnerability that allows someone to take control of the victim’s computer through Internet Explorer, Farmer said.

Information Services suggests that everyone who is infected with this virus contact them so they can get control of the virus, Edmondson said. Students, faculty or anyone affected by this virus can get information and helpful tools off of the ResNet Web site (sea.tcu.edu), he said.

The Microsoft home page (www.microsoft.com) also has all the tools, along with information about the viruses and what to look for if you are not sure you are infected.

Edmondson said if students need any help they should contact the Information Commons located in the Mary Couts Burnett Library or call them at (817) 257-5855.

John Ashley Menzies