Chris Pile (programmer)
Christopher Pile | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1968 or 1969 (age 54–55) |
| Occupation | Programmer |
| Known for | Created the computer viruses 'Pathogen' and 'Queeg' |
Christopher Pile (born 1968 or 1969, also known as "the Black Baron") is a programmer who was sentenced to 18 months in jail in 1995 for creating and spreading two computer viruses called Pathogen and Queeg.[1] While Pile was not the first person convicted for creating and spreading computer viruses, his case was the first "widely covered and published computer crime case that ended in a jail sentence"[2] as well as the first such case to be prosecuted in England and Wales.[3]
In addition to the two viruses, he also created Smeg (short for "Simulated Metamorphic Encryption enGine"[4]), a software tool that he used to hide Pathogen and Queeg from the antivirus software of the time. Smeg was written in a way that allowed it to be also used by others to hide and spread their own viruses.[2]
References
- ^ Victor, Peter (16 November 1995). "'Mad boffin' jailed over computer virus havoc". The Independent. Archived from the original on 26 June 2011. Retrieved 3 February 2011.
- ^ ISBN 978-0-387-25228-5.
- ISSN 0022-0183.
- ISBN 978-0-429-13161-5.
External links
- Article from Crypt Magazine on Pile, 1996
- A general description of the methods behind a polymorph engine, written by Pile under his Black Baron guise.
- Chris Piles' Asteroids emulator for PCs
- A page about Chris Pile's software for Z80-based computers
- Defender, Chris Piles' Defender Game for the Sam Coupe