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> John Sellers writes:
>
> > I wrote last time that "Others may wish to open my BMP file it is
> > contaminated with virus. I can not explain what these setting mean
> > but with time maybe come to understand their significance." It
> > should have included the word "not" in front of the word
> > contaminated.
> >
> > The attached file is safe.
>
> Can .bmp files contain virii? They're never executed.
>
Well in fact they can. But this needs an additional "virus-executor".
The system works as follows: the .bmp-files gets loaded into memory.
As this is an ordinary binary file, it may contain malicious code.
The "virus-executor" can either directly start the .bmp or reset
the stack-pointer to the code and initiate a crash. Problem with
this combination is, that the virus-code gets loaded without being
checked by anti-virus-software.
Viruses with this functionality have been discussed theoretically.
Chances are good, that there is no active virus around, because
it's activation-scenario is statistically quite unlikely.
Regards,
Andreas
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