“From digital mischief to outright destruction”

The 1980s and 1990s PC viruses were a special breed. The MS-DOS operating system wasn’t particularly secure – few home computer operating systems were back then – so viruses could spread quickly, and many did. Some of the viruses focused more on actually wreaking havoc and destroying things, and some primarily on effective propagation that served no additional purpose. The last group was viruses that were maybe… a little bit exhibitionist, announcing themselves with various audio-visual effects of the kind of quality you might expect from vintage computers in the hands of bored programmers. Various antivirus programs were as much a necessity back then as ad blockers feel today. In Poland, the most popular one was called MkS_Vir – named after its creator, Marek Sell. I believe MkS_Vir had a reputation for being great at detecting the viruses and disinfecting machines, but part of its appeal was that it also hosted something that you could call a virus zoo – a few actual viruses,…

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