How Rumors Get Started: The Story of the Trojan Horse Virus Warning

The Plaid Adder
Comments: plaidder@mindspring.com

I will admit it: for some time now, I have aspired to be the author of one of those things that everyone forwards to everyone else over email. You know, like "Top 100 Reasons why a Cucumber is Better Than Bill Clinton," only funny. The problem of course is that my brand of humor is a little quirky and has a very appreciative but very limited audience. The Santorini's Four thought we might have broken into the mass market with "The Lewinsky Scandal from A to Z," but our timing was poor--we wrote it at the tail end of the scandal when the sleaze-loving American public had gorged itself to repletion and could not consume even one more tiny wafer-thin dinner mint. Strangely, I had better luck with something I was sure would have a much narrower appeal--a parody of "Good Times" and all the rest of those computer virus hoaxes that go round and round the 'net forwarded by clueless people. It was suggested to me by the fact that there is a category of computer virus called the Trojan Horse virus, which hides inside another program and then leaps out to wreak havoc after you let it into your hard drive.

Well, I'm in love with an ex-classicist, which means that I have had to read a lot of the Aeneid. So I put together the Trojan Horse Virus Warning. The original version read like this:

The First Recorded Virus Hoax

All this talk about Trojan horses got me thinking...

* * *

FROM: laocoon@doomgloom.edu

TO: Trojan Army Listserv [Trojans-L@troy.org]

RE: WARNING!! BEWARE GREEKS BEARING GIFTS!

Hey Hector,

This was forwarded to me by Cassandra--it looks legit. Please distribute to Priam, Hecuba, and your 99 siblings.

Thanks,

Laocoon

* * *

WARNING! WARNING! WARNING!

IF YOU RECEIVE A GIFT IN THE SHAPE OF A LARGE WOODEN HORSE DO NOT DOWNLOAD IT!!!! It is EXTREMELY DESTRUCTIVE and will overwrite your ENTIRE CITY!

The "gift" is disguised as a large wooden horse about two stories tall. It tends to show up outside the city gates and appears to be abandoned. DO NOT let it through the gates! It contains hardware that is incompatible with Trojan programming, including a crowd of heavily armed Greek warriors that will destroy your army, sack your town, and kill your women and children. If you have already received such a gift, DO NOT OPEN IT! Take it back out of the city unopened and set fire to it by the beach.

FORWARD THIS MESSAGE TO EVERYONE YOU KNOW!

Poseidon

* * *

FROM: hector@studmuffin.com

TO: laocoon@doomgloom.edu

RE: Greeks bearing gifts

Laocoon,

I hate to break to you, but this is one of the oldest hoaxes there is. I've seen variants on this warning come through on other listservs, one involving some kind of fruit that was supposed to kill the people who ate it and one having to do with something called the "Midas Touch." Here are a few tipoffs that this is a hoax:

1) This "Forward this message to everyoen you know" crap. If it were really meant as a warning about the Greek army, why tell anyone to post it to the Phonecians, Sumerians, and Cretans?

2) Use of exclamation points. Always a giveaway.

3) It's signed "from Poseidon." Granted he's had his problems with Odysseus but he's one of their guys, isn't he? Besides, the lack of a real header with a detailed address makes me suspicious.

4) Technically speaking, there is no way for a horse to overwrite your entire city. A horse is just an animal, after all.

Next time you get a message like this, just delete it. I appreciate your concern, but once you've been around the block a couple times you'll realize how annoying this kind of stuff is.

Bye now,

Hector

* * *

FROM: Daemon@listserv.doomgloom.edu

TO: hector@studmuffin.com

RE: Undeliverable mail

The following message had permanent fatal errors. Please check the email address (or check to see that your intended recipient has not been swallowed up by a large sea serpent).

FROM: hector@studmuffin.com

TO: laocoon@doomgloom.edu

RE: Greeks bearing gifts

Laocoon,

I hate to break to you, but this is one of the oldest hoaxes there is..

* * *

FORWARD THIS TO EVERYONE YOU KNOW,

THe Plaid Adder

I forwarded this version to a feminist sci-fi list I was on. Later, I decided to share it with some of my classicist friends, but I did a little revision on it to make it funnier for them. For instance, in the second version the original message is from Apollo, not Poseidon, which makes more sense because of his association with Cassandra. Here's the second, improved verison that went out to my classicist friends:

The First Recorded Virus Hoax, Version B

* * *

FROM: laocoon@doomgloom.edu

TO: hector@studmuffin.com

RE: WARNING!! BEWARE GREEKS BEARING GIFTS!

Hey Hector,

This was forwarded to me by Cassandra--it looks legit. Please distribute to Priam, Hecuba, and your 99 siblings.

Thanks,

Laocoon

* * *

WARNING! WARNING! WARNING!

IF YOU RECEIVE A GIFT IN THE SHAPE OF A LARGE WOODEN HORSE DO NOT DOWNLOAD IT!!!! It is EXTREMELY DESTRUCTIVE and will overwrite your ENTIRE CITY!

The "gift" is disguised as a large wooden horse about two stories tall. It tends to show up outside the city gates and appears to be abandoned. DO NOT let it through the gates! It contains hardware that is incompatible with Trojan programming. It will destroy your army, sack your town, and kill your women and children. If you have already received such a gift, DO NOT OPEN IT! Take it back out of the city unopened and set fire to it by the beach.

FORWARD THIS MESSAGE TO EVERYONE YOU KNOW!

Good luck,

Apollo

* * *

FROM: hector@studmuffin.com

TO: laocoon@doomgloom.edu

RE: Greeks bearing gifts

Laocoon,

I hate to break to you, but this is one of the oldest hoaxes there is. I've seen variants on this warning come through on other listservs; the most famous was the "Pandora's Box" hoax, which is practically as old as the HelleNet. Here are a few tipoffs that this is a hoax:

1) This "Forward this message to everyone you know" crap. If it were really meant as a warning about the Greek army, why tell anyone to post it to the Phonecians, Sumerians, and Cretans?

2) Use of exclamation points. Always a giveaway.

3) It's signed "Apollo." So far as I know, the gods do not have email. In any case, the lack of a real header with a detailed address is always an indication that the message is not genuine.

4) It is not technically possible for a horse to overwrite your entire city. A horse is just an animal, after all.

Next time you get a message like this, just delete it. I appreciate your concern, but once you've been around the block a couple times you'll realize how annoying this kind of stuff is.

Bye now,

Hector. * * *

FROM: Daemon@listserv.doomgloom.edu

TO: hector@studmuffin.com

RE: Undeliverable mail

The following message had permanent fatal errors. Please check the email address (or check to see that your intended recipient has not been swallowed up by a large sea serpent).

FROM: hector@studmuffin.com

TO: laocoon@doomgloom.edu

RE: Greeks bearing gifts...

* * *

Forward this to everyone you know!

What has happened has been interesting. Within days, Chris reported its reappearance on some of the classics listservs he was on--curiously enough, in the original version, which must somehow have found its way over there from the sci-fi community. It has reappeared there several times since then. However, the message got progressively shorter. The "undeliverable mail" message from Laocoon's listserv, which is a joke that only people who remember the whole Aeneid thing would get, was stripped off early (along with the header and any evidence of authorship). Later versions also stripped off Hector's response. Then, somehow, it got picked up by a bunch of "joke of the day" sites and servers, and now the damn thing is everywhere. In fact, I found it on a few virus hoax sites, listed as an actual virus hoax--evidently by people who are unfamiliar with the classical tradition and didn't realize it was a joke.

Many of the joke's fans have come up with amusing variations on it. Steven Boyd and Kirk Poore, who are both members of a chapter of the Society for Creative Anachronism came up with some great stuff, including a truly hilarious protocol for fixing the virus (thanks to Katriana for alerting me to this). I also found a bulletin board for a bunch of home-improvement do-it-yourselfers who had generated a string of really funny suggestions for what to do with the horse (a little duct tape and some PVC pipe and it makes a dandy summer home). Sadly, I don't have the link to that one. In July, 2001 the joke was, unbeknownst to me, honored with a Yanking The Chain award, created by the Break the Chain site "to recognize logical, passionate, and effective arguments against the spread of junk on the 'net." I'm so proud. Almost all the recurrences were of Version A, which I think is less funny than version B. It is better to be first than good.

It took a few months, but it was eventually forwarded back to the list to which I had originally sent the thing, by someone else who had no idea that it had originated there. I hailed this as a moment of triumph.

What is a little more frightening is that Chris recently discovered that some classicist with too much time on his hands has translated the thing into Latin. Here is the Latin version:

M. Moskowitz omnibus sodalibus s.p.d.

Si monitiones virorum computatralum vidistis, fortasse haec vobis placebit: ----

EIS: Trojani-L@troja.org

RE: CAVE!! TIME DANAOS ET DONA FERENTES!

Ave Hector,

Haec epistula mihi remisit Cassandra--videtur rectam. Remitte, quaeso, Priamo Hecubaeque XCIXque fratribus et sororibus.

Gratias,

Laocoon

----------------------------------------------------------------

CAVE! CAVE! CAVE!

SI DONUM TIBI DATUM EST CUI FORMA EQUI INGENTIS LIGNEI, NOLI ID EXTRAHERE!!!! Est PERNICIOSUM et TOTAM URBEM rescribiat!

Hoc "donum" simulat equum magnum ligneum, circa triginti pedes altitudinis. Solet apparere ex portis urbis et videtur relictum. NOLI per portas ire sinere! Ei inest armatura quae non bene congruit programmatibus Troianis, haud excepta turba bellatorum Graecorum qui bellatores exercitum tuum vastabunt, oppidum tuum diripiant, et mulieres liberosque tuos interficiant. Si tale donum iam tibi datum esset, NOLI ID APERIRE! Inapertum ex urbe donum retrahe et in litore crema.

OMNIBUS COGNITIS HANC EPISTULAM REMITTE!

Poseidon

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

AB: hector@ilium.gov.ti

EO: laocoon@troia.edu

RE: Danais dona ferentibus

Laocoon,

Dicere me piget hanc fraudem unam ex antiquissimis fraudibus esse. Monitiones similes in gregibus aliis vidi, unam de fructe quae sumptores occidit, et alteram de quodam cui nomen "tactus Midae." Haec sunt signa quibus hanc fraudem esse scias:

i) Hoc stercus "Omnibus cognitis hanc epistulam remitte." Si vere de exercitu Graeco tractat, quare aliquem jube remittere Punicis, Sumeriis, Cretanisque?

ii) Puncta exclamationis. Signa certa falsitatis.

iii) Num scripsit Poseidon? Non semper Ulixem amat, sed nonne est pro parte Graeca? Praeterea, inscriptionis verae inopiam suspicor.

iv) Technicaliter, non potest equus urbem totam rescribere. Equus non alius quam animali est.

Insequentem talem epistulam dele. Cura tua mihi placet, sed cum non jam tiro his in rebus esses, sentias quam taedet haec epistulae.

Vale,

Hector

--- End Forwarded Message ---

Chris finds the translation inelegant, but literary considerations aside it's pretty faithful to the original (Version A). It is also conclusive proof that someone out there is crazier than I am.

A couple years after I sent out the original Trojan Horse virus hoax, I was attacked by a real Trojan Horse virus, which arrived disguised as a text attachment which I was foolish enough to open. The story of my epic battle with said virus, and how my friend Laura saved my computer, is up here.

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