Netsky worm

Netsky is a prolific family of computer worms. The first variant appeared on Monday, February 16th, 2004. The "B" variant was the first family member to find its way into mass distribution. It appeared on Wednesday, February 18th, 2004. 18-year-old Sven Jaschan of Germany confessed to having written the worms.

Although individual functions vary widely from virus to virus, the Netsky family perhaps is most famous for comments contained within the code of its variants insulting the authors of the Bagle and MyDoom worm families and, in some cases, routines that removed versions of these viruses. The "war" as it was referred to in the media caused a steady increase in the number of variant viruses produced in these families. As of June 2004, Bagle had approximately 28, Netsky approximately 29, and MyDoom approximately 10.

Other symptoms of Netsky included beeping sounds on specified dates, usually in the morning hours.

The worm was sent out as an email, enticing recipients to open an attachment. Once opened, the attached program would scan the computer for email addresses and email itself to all addresses found.