Wolf K explained on 8/5/2014 :
> On 2014-08-04 8:29 PM, FromTheRafters wrote:
>> David W. Hodgins submitted this idea :
>>> On Mon, 04 Aug 2014 10:46:04 -0400, FromTheRafters
>>>  wrote:
>>>
>>>> Virus Guy wrote on 8/4/2014 :
>>
>> No, I wrote that.
>>
>>>> Isn't a Microsoft Word document a file?
>>>
>>> Yes
>>>
>>>> Is a bootsector a file?
>>>
>>> No. It's the first sector of the drive being booted from, though
>>> many boot loaders will also use additional sectors, up to the 64th
>>> sector, as that was the standard location for starting the first
>>> partition on old ata hard drives.
>
> Semantics. The boot sector contains a file. The data in the file points to 
> the location of the program that loads the OS, but, as you well know, you 
> can start all kinds of things before loading the OS. Etc.
>
>>>> Is BIOS a file?
>>>
>>> No. It's usually an eprom chip on the motherboard, that is used
>>> during startup to find the hard drive to boot from, and then load
>>> the boots ector from that drive, and then transfer control to the
>>> code from that boot sector. I say usually, as some older mother
>>> boards used a prom, so a bios update required replacing the chip.
>
> BIOS is a file (data and program) that starts the boot process. Where and 
> how BIOS is stored is irrelevant. It's still a file. Eg, PROM vs EEPROM 
> makes no difference. In very early micro-computers, as you may recall, BIOS 
> was a configuration of switches on the front panel. In later computers, 
> much of what we now consider BIOS was on the external storage media from 
> which the OS was loaded. For that matter, a universal bootloader could be 
> included in BIOS, if the industry agreed on a standard. Etc. Think of BIOS 
> as a minimal OS.
>
>> Exactly so. My point to VG was, malware start method persistence not
>> based on a file is nothing new.
>>
>> Granted, the approach being used is interesting. I wonder if Virus Guy's
>> modified Win98 still has the decoder - he might have eradicated it. I
>> don't think it is strictly necessary, looks like just obfuscation related.
>
> Start method persistence is impossible without some data stored somewhere. 
> IOW, sure, there's a file. You just have to figure out where it is.
>
> Have a good day,

I disagree with this usage when in this context. These entities exist 
and are accessed before there is a file system extant to access true 
files.


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