The Giant Black Book of Computer Viruses

Customer Review: Aging book on viruses is still great for learning system programming

This book was written over ten years ago, so obviously you are not going to read it and be on the cutting edge of virus writing and protection at this point. However, this book is still an excellent one for those who want to learn the ins and outs of Windows systems programming including how your computer can be controlled/manipulated using some assembly language and the operating system as it already exists. Basically, the author is using the subject of viruses to educate you on the fine points of assembly language programming for the PC without you knowing it was ever happening. I highly recommend it. However, as other reviewers have already said, the book is now free online, so don't pay some ridiculously high price believing its contents are a rare find.



This book is written to be accessible to anyone with a little experience with assembly language programming, or to anyone with any programming experience, provided they're willing to do a little work to learn assembler. Actually, this book acts as a pretty good tutorial on assembly language programming itself. The book is broken down into three parts. The first section discusses viral reproduction techniques, ranging from the simplest overwriting virus to complex multi-partite viruses and viruses for advanced operating systems. The second section discusses anti anti-virus techniques commonly used in viruses, including simple techniques to hide file changes, ways to hide virus code from prying eyes, and polymorphism. The third section discusses payloads, both destructive and beneficial. The following is the table of contents.



Introduction

Computer Virus Basics



PART I

The Simplest COM Infector

Companion Viruses

Parasitic COM Infectors: Part I

Parasitic COM Infectors: Part II

A Memory Resident Virus

Infecting EXE Files

Advanced Memory Residence Techniques

An Introduction to Boot Sector Viruses

The Most Successful Boot Sector Virus

Advanced Boot Sector Techniques

Multi-Partite Viruses

Infecting Device Drivers

Windows Viruses

An OS/2 Virus

Unix Viruses

Source Code Viruses

Many New Techniques



Part II: Anti-Anti Virus Techniques

How A Virus Detector Works

Exercises

Stealth for Boot Sector Viruses

Stealth Techniques for File Infectors

Protected Mode Stealth

Polymorphic Viruses

Retaliating Viruses

Advanced Anti-Virus Techniques

Genetic Viruses

Who Will Win?



Part III. Payloads for Viruses

Destructive Code

A Viral Unix Security Breach

Operating System Holes and Covert Channels

A Good Virus

Appendix A: ISR Reference

Appendix B: Resources

Customer Review: Older edition is free on the Internet

This book is a classic exposition on the programming of computer viruses. I concur with the other reviewers in that this is the best book ever on the subject (it is likely the only book on the subject from my searches). The first edition of this book is free to download from the publisher's website (search for American Eagle Publications in Google because Amazon.com won't let me put the URL) (it requires you to register but that is free too) along with the Little Black Book of Computer Viruses and lots of other information. THIS BOOK CAN STILL BE PURCHASED NEW FROM THE PUBLISHER'S WEBSITE for forty dollars, so don't order an overpriced used copy from Amazon.com (at the time of this writing, some jerk was trying to sell it for over one hundred dollars used! What a rip-off!).
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