Hello KURT.

13 Sep 04 23:30, you wrote to me:

 KW> -=> JASEN BETTS wrote to KURT WISMER <=-

 KW>>> o "email viruses" are OFF-TOPIC!  They do NOT exist!

 JB>>> Are we supposed to call them worms instead?

 JB>> but they're not worms because they don't spread by themselves...

 KW> that is not necessarily part of the definition of a worm...

even your definition make no mention of human assistance.
this has been the one I've been using.

:worm: n. [from `tapeworm' in John Brunner's novel "The Shockwave Rider",
   via XEROX PARC] A program that propagates itself over a network,
   reproducing itself as it goes. Compare {virus}. Nowadays the term has
   negative connotations, as it is assumed that only {cracker}s write
   worms. Perhaps the best-known example was Robert T. Morris's {Great
   Worm} of 1988, a `benign' one that got out of control and hogged
   hundreds of Suns and VAXen across the U.S. See also {cracker}, {RTM},
   {Trojan horse}, {ice}.

 JB>> the user has to alteast run the email application and usually
 JB>> open the message too and often then open(or run) an attachment...

 KW> that doesn't make it any less a worm...

To me that makes it a trojan horse, escpecially in the last case.

Jasen

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