Tech Time Warp is a weekly feature that looks back at interesting moments and milestones in tech history.
Tag: Tech Time Warp
Tech Time Warp: The cybersecurity industry begins with RSA patent
Tech Time Warp: The cybersecurity industry begins with RSA patent
October 1 kicks off Cybersecurity Awareness Month, now in its 18th year. A joint initiative of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) and the National Cyber Security Alliance (NCSA), the awareness month seeks to educate individuals and organizations about...
Tech Time Warp: Swen worm poses as security patch
Tech Time Warp: Swen worm poses as security patch
The hits for network admins kept coming in late summer/early fall 2003. Just weeks after the Blaster-Welchia-SoBig.F triple punch, the Swen worm wriggled its way onto at least 1.5 million computers. Like so many other pieces of malware, Swen exploited...
Tech Time Warp: The first FORTRAN program runs
Tech Time Warp: The first FORTRAN program runs
Although FORTRAN was not commercially released until 1957, the date September 20, 1954, is also significant in the history of the groundbreaking computer language. That’s when the first FORTRAN program successfully ran while in development at IBM. John Backus worked...
Tech Time Warp: eBay Inc. gets its start
Tech Time Warp: eBay Inc. gets its start
What are your Labor Day weekend plans? Chances are they won’t prove as lucrative as those of Pierre Omidyar back in 1995, who spent his three-day weekend launching a website called AuctionWeb from his San Jose home. We now know...
Tech Time Warp: Happy birthday to the Computer Misuse Act
Tech Time Warp: Happy birthday to the Computer Misuse Act
Happy 31st birthday to the British Computer Misuse Act (CMA), which went into effect Aug. 29, 1990, as one of the first cybercrime laws on the books. Although the CMA has undergone several revisions, many cybersecurity experts believe it’s desperately...
Tech Time Warp: The One-Two-Three Viral Punch of August 2003
Tech Time Warp: The One-Two-Three Viral Punch of August 2003
August qualifies as the dog days of summer. It’s a good time to take it easy and use some PTO. But that’s not something the network administrators of 2003 could do, thanks to an onslaught of viruses. August 2003 brought...
Tech Time Warp: Andy Warhol and the Amiga
Tech Time Warp: Andy Warhol and the Amiga
The format of the Apple product launch is legendary, but it doesn’t hold a candle to the July 23, 1985, launch of the Commodore Amiga 1000. Held at Lincoln Center, with Commodore employees sporting tuxes and the music of a...
Tech Time Warp: Zeus, Ruler of Malware?
Tech Time Warp: Zeus, Ruler of Malware?
The Zeus malware, like its Greek god namesake, is a powerful and virile Trojan malware. Since it first surfaced in July 2007 in an attack on the U.S. Department of Transportation, Zeus, aka Zbot, and its variants have wreaked havoc on the...
Tech Time Warp: 1964 Olympic Games, aka the Technology Olympics
Tech Time Warp: 1964 Olympic Games, aka the Technology Olympics
As the world’s eyes turn to Tokyo for the postponed 2020 Olympic Games, delayed to this year because of the COVID-19 pandemic, it’s worth also looking back at the 1964 Tokyo Games. Known as the “Technology Olympics,” the 1964 Games...
Tech Time Warp: Sneaky SirCam worm slithers through inboxes
Tech Time Warp: Sneaky SirCam worm slithers through inboxes
When it comes to use of social engineering in malware, the SirCam worm must be among the most insidious. The worm propagated itself in the usual way via email attachment. But SirCam didn’t carry a new email attachment—the typical “invoice”...
