In an embarrassing development for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, this Senior Technology BSer for TheSequitur.comhas learned that a computer worm has been found infecting certain laptops that were used to e-mail mission control from the International Space Station. Perhaps even more embarrassing is that NASA astronauts still use e-mail and not space-mail, a fuzzy concept that just popped into my head.
According to Symantec, a computer security, storage and systems management solution provider, the worm named W32.Gammima.AG propagates via removable media and attempts to steal passwords for online games. Perhaps a target may have been online game accounts used by online game junky JASPER, NASA's more modern version of NORAD's WOPR (a.k.a. JOSHUA and seen in the 1983 classic film "WarGames") an artificially intelligent computer. However, NASA has said that none of the infected laptops were networked to the space station's control systems or the Internet. [Wikipedia, TimesOnline, Symantec, Wikipedia2]Brian Williams, a TheSequitur.com senior editor and systems director, studies sociology at Morehead State University.
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