The Computer Virus That is Puzzling the Internet | BadBIOS

to get a 14-day free trial and see if your personal information has been compromised.

Since the dawn of time, the world has been filled with threats and those who try to understand them. And this applies to the digital world as well, and there was certainly a time, not too long ago in fact, where most people didn’t understand these threats at all. So, throughout the 1990s, on the NEW worldwide web, you end up having these mass panics of computer viruses with alleged capabilities that go beyond the screen, almost supernatural. And of course, many people rode on these fears either in jest or to obtain some kind of control on those who are gullible. Just like how the satirical tabloid “Weekly World News” once published a story about a computer virus that can spread to humans. Because that’s ridiculous! We all know how a computer virus works, it’s a malicious piece of code that is able to replicate itself and infect other computers on the same network, whether it’s the internet or some kind of local network, where it can then do whatever it is programmed TO do. And that’s the key, you need SOME kind of connection to another computer. It’s not a real virus in the literal sense; it can’t spread through the air, right?

Well in October of 2010, something very unnerving allegedly happened. A man named Dragos Ruiu, the main developer behind the annual Pwn2Own hacking competition. He had just installed a new copy of Mac OS X on his MacBook Air, and it was then that he started to notice the computer suddenly had a mind of its own. For starters, his CD drive was no longer working, he couldn’t boot from any CD placed into his system. He thought okay, maybe this was just a hardware issue, but then noticed that all of his system configurations kept undoing themselves. His system data then started getting deleted. He was starting to think that this wasn’t a hardware issue, but instead some kind of malware. So he went ahead and completely wiped the hard drive and reinstalled the operating system, but sure enough, the problem still persisted. As it turned out, this issue wasn’t coming from the hard drive, but the BIOS, the motherboard of the computer, meaning that even a full system restore couldn’t fix it. But it doesn’t even stop there. He noticed that this malware was now spreading across other computers on his network, even ones with different operating systems. He quickly disconnected them from his network, but it just kept going. And so, as a last resort, he disabled his Wi-Fi and Bluetooth and even unplugged the power from his wall, relying only on the battery. This is a technique called “air-gapping,” as these computers were now completely independent from one another, in their own separate worlds…yet the virus was still spreading, even to computers who were never connected to the internet in the first place.

The malware became known as “BadBIOS,” which was capable of infecting Mac, Windows, Linux, and BSD systems, and word quickly started getting around the internet that it may just be the very first instance of a computer virus spreading through the air, quite literally. Through its strange, completely unknown engineering, it was somehow able to bypass these “air gaps.” Surprisingly, it gets even weirder…actual word of the virus seems to have spread faster than the virus itself, and that’s because we...don’t even know if it exists. BadBIOS has become an incredibly controversial, divisive subject within niche parts of the tech community, with some people swearing by it, others scoffing at how ridiculous it is, and then those who believe it to be nothing more than an elaborate hoax. And today, we are going to talk about this strange origin story. This is BadBIOS, the world’s most mysterious computer virus.

Support me on Patreon!

Join this channel to get access to perks:

Google +: just kidding.

Wholesome by Kevin MacLeod

All images, sounds, and clips are either created by me, properly licensed, in the public domain, under a Creative Commons license with attribution provided, or protected under Fair Use.

Creative Commons images used:
CC: Grm wnr
CC: Bobby B
CC: Bill Bertram
CC: SecretLondon123

ENJOY THE PROGRAM.

[nationsquid]

to get a 14-day free trial and see if your personal information has been compromised.

[Robdeltonie]

I think I can debunk this once and for all: If the OP said the CD drive stopped working on his MacBook Air, then it's a hoax. It's impossible for a MacBook Air's CD drive to stop working. That's because they never had one. MacBook Airs never had a CD or DVD drive of any kind. It was one of the things mentioned in the keynote where Steve Jobs first announced the computer. So, if that's the first "symptom" of BadBIOS that Dragos Ruiu noticed, then I think it's safe to say the whole thing is made up.

[MysticClaws]

My favourite part about the nirvana bit at 10:18 is you're not even playing Nirvana, you're playing an obscure Green day track from their first album

[pmc_]

Malware like this is a good spooky story, but it's entirely infeasible as far as I can figure out. You'd need a zero-day in basically every single sound card driver ever.

[elvendragonhammer]

I work in IT/security (in software, hardware repair, & programming) Some years a go I did work for a client where a virus spread to 12 of his computers- it was NOT this virus though, if it ever existed. However there was a similarity- wiping the drives did just let it re-install. Started checking to see if it was creating a hidden partition on the HD & reinstalling from there, or staying in memory in an expansion card (there were some similar to this that could hide in your dedicated video or sound card & used it's processor & ram as a staging area to re-infect the system after a re-install). After a bit of tracing I found out the virus was actually in the router itself, & had originally gotten access because the routers access info had never been changed after the factory preset. After flashing the routers bios it wasn't an issue anymore, still tracked down where it came from & added lines into the windows hosts file of the server & router to make sure that it'd never be allowed to try to go back to those IP's or any domain/subnet connected to them. Was a tricky lil bugger for sure, but ultimately just needed the right insecticide- me.

[Nethuja_GunawardaneSL]

New fear unlocked: Science-fiction computer viruses

[DamianOchramowicz]

It is a fun creepypasta, nothing more. It would require an entire protocol to transfer the virus using speakers and microphone, with error correction and so on. It basically implies that you can control the operating system with microphone (saving executable file and then running it), you would need another protocol for that.

Then you have problem of overwriting BIOS from the level of operating system, which I don't think is even possible. Back in the day you would have to run BIOS Setup before OS had even started to update it from the floppy.

[ebmar]

QR code goes to The Beatles - All My Loving

[TSFboi]

"there's a high pitched sound in this room and it's giving computers viruses" is the kind of information that makes someone crazy with paranoia

[presidentkiller]

The only two ways this could be possible are:

1. Somebody working at the computer companies know about a series of vulnerabilities that make this possible, and is actively exploiting them.

2. Some government agency has access to a backdoor that was discovered by a third party that exploits it, or the government agency itself (either willingly or because they've been compromised) is exploiting it.

As you said, this is a very expensive and complicated way to make malware, so only those two options kinda make sense.

[valmarsiglia]

"Communicating information with sound is not at all unheard of. We've been doing it for hundreds of years." Yeah, I think we've been doing that for a bit longer, lol.

[brianm.]

Anyone who works with electronics knows that coils in circuits can generate high frequency sounds, since the coil vibrates when working at high frequencies, and sometimes it is audible. Excellent story, it's for a black mirror episode haha 😂

[MightyDantheman]

That bone scanning malware isn't as ridiculous when you learn that HP's excuse for their printers requiring 1st-party ink cartridges is that it's possible for 3rd-arty ink cartridges to contain malware. Although, I guess the big difference here is that HP intentionally created a problem so that they could be the solution to said problem.

[Subspace.T.Tripmine]

"It infects Linux, BSD, Windows". Me using templeos: You have no power here, Gandalf the grey.

[Mempler]

UEFI and BIOS are still effectively the same.

One of which are just easier to use. BIOS itself is a pain but very simple to use and implement. UEFI can be worse, UEFI implementations depend to have firmware bugs, super annoying shit when doing osdev

But uefi has a lot of benifits like built-in boot-loader drivers and secure boot. and generally is indeed easier to use as it is a plain C api, every Win32 developer should be familiar with.

[elbiggus]

"A lot less options to choose from computer-wise in the 80s"? Citation needed!

In the here and now there are essentially two basic CPU platforms - x86 and ARM - and while there may be a gazillion motherboard manufacturers the underlying architectures are fairly homogenised (particularly in the x86 world). In the 80s, however, we had a myriad of CPUs - 8088, x86, Z80, 6502, 680x0, TMS9900, etc. - and even computers that shared a CPU would often have wildly different architectures. In the UK in the 1980s we had the ZX Spectrum, BBC/Acorn, Oric, Amstrad CPC, MSX, Dragon, Atari 8-bit, Atari ST, Amiga, PC, VIC-20/C64/C128, Mac, and probably a bunch more I've forgotten. The 80s were a wild time!

[drako_claw]

People forget that early Internet connections, especially early dial up (14.4k in particular) - the data connection was made entirely by sound. So you were receiving data via sound. The v.92 dial up modems were the first I saw that used a digitized connection after the initial dial in an handshake, which was still done by sound. (The noise of robots killing each other.)

[jaymogrified]

Even if it’s not possible as written, I gotta give kudos to the “Bones” writer(s) who came up with the idea of malware carved into a skeleton; very creative and forward-thinking, especially if it’s theoretically possible for it to have done something under the right circumstances.

[WolfPackGamingOfficial]

To be honest, a movie about AI turning evil and infecting computers due to a sound sounds like a cool plot. Nice video BTW!

[ShadowSora]

About that Bones episode you're talking about: the reason Angela's computer went up in flames (according to the logic of the show, not necessarily real life) is because the virus not only disabled the computer's cooling system, but also disabled any fail-safes against the inital disabling, which caused her computer to overheat. Like you, NationSquid, I dunno if that would actually cause it to go up in flames or not, but I just wanted to add some context to that scene.

Anyway, I like that you covered what is essentially an urban legend, while explaining some of the logistics of it, instead of just calling it a hoax and calling it a day. I definitely learned a few things from this video.