Chris Pile (programmer)

For other people named Chris Pile, see Chris Pile (disambiguation).
Christopher Pile
Born1968 or 1969 (age 55–56)
OccupationProgrammer
Known forCreated 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]

  1. ^ 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.
  2. ^ a b Kizza, Joseph Migga (2005). "Security Threats to Computer Networks". Computer Network Security. Springer. pp. 77–107. doi:10.1007/0-387-25228-2_3. ISBN 978-0-387-25228-5.
  3. ^ Fafinski, Stefan (2006). "Access Denied: Computer Misuse in an Era of Technological Change". The Journal of Criminal Law. 70 (5): 424–442. doi:10.1350/jcla.2006.70.5.424. ISSN 0022-0183.
  4. ^ Chen, Thomas M.; Robert, Jean-Marc (2004). "The Evolution of Viruses and Worms". In Chen, William W.S. (ed.). Statistical Methods in Computer Security. doi:10.1201/9781420030884. ISBN 978-0-429-13161-5.