What’s the origin of the term ‘computer virus’? When was it first coined?

This page contains a chat with Grok, a chatbot by xAI available at x.com.

Grok 2 minibeta

😎 What’s the origin of the term “computer virus”? When was it first coined or used?

🤖 The term “virus” was first used in the context of computer programs by Fred Cohen in a 1984 research paper. He defined it as a program that can “infect” other programs by modifying them to include a copy of itself, similar to how biological viruses infect living cells. This definition laid the foundation for understanding and combating computer viruses.

Quote

World Wide Stats

@the10stats

·

@theworldindex

World’s First PC Virus:

The world’s first PC virus was created by two Pakistani brothers.

Basit Farooq Alvi and Amjad Farooq Alvi accidentally created “Brain,” which was discovered in 1986 and targeted IBM PC platforms.

Quote

EXAIR

@EXAIR

·

DID YOU KNOW: The first ever virus on an Apple computer was developed in 1981. It was called “Elk Cloner” and was created by a 15 year old high school student to prank his friends.

Quote

The Corolla Virus™

@Frank94147822

·

@PAMsLOvE

My first computer was a laptop, when I worked for Edison Brother Stores 1993 Circa.
We used lotus software, I remember getting a black market copy of Microsoft . What a difference.

Quote

TM Floyd & Company

@TMFloydandCo

·

The first computer virus, named “Creeper,” was created in the early 1970s as an experiment by a researcher named Bob Thomas. It spread through ARPANET, the precursor to the internet, displaying the message “I’m the creeper, catch me if you can!”

#FunFactFriday

#FunFact

Quote

Secret Diary

@SecretDiary

·

@liz_churchill10

Jill Fences is the real origin of the Frankenstein coronavirus. She is minted, but utterly despised.

THEN:
Infect computers with viruses and then sell anti-virus software. 

NOW:
Infect people with viruses and then sell vaccines.

Quote

hitesh.eth

@hmalviya9

·

teaching people coding viruses was my first exposure to blogging..14 years back.. and i used to go by the alias called “mafia boy”.. it was my CS alias too.

http://hmalviya.blogspot.com

http://