Attorney General Ashcroft Warns of New Computer Virus

18 September 2001

Attorney General Ashcroft Warns of New Computer Virus

Says virus appears unrelated to terrorist attacks

U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft, briefing reporters at the Justice Department on September 18, issued a warning about a new computer virus known as "NIMDA." Ashcroft stressed that "there is no evidence at this time which links this infection to the terrorist attacks" that targeted New York and Washington on September 11.

Following is an excerpt from his briefing, pertaining to the computer virus:

U.S. Department of Justice
September 18, 2001

Attorney General Remarks
Press Briefing
FBI headquarters

ATTY GEN. ASHCROFT:

As you all may be aware, a new Internet infection designed NIMDA -- some people say that's "ADMIN" backwards -- it is, but I'm not sure if that's consequential -- was noted this morning. It may have started as early as yesterday, and it infects computers on the Internet worldwide. The computers that are infected then scan the Internet in search of other computers. And this very substantially expands the traffic load on the Internet. The scanning activity thus far indicates that this could be heavier than the July activity with Code Red. Our government together with the private sector -- which is, incidentally, a very strong and powerful partnership when we work together -- is assessing the problem. And we'll try and provide more information from the FBI to you about this later today.

In the meantime, I'm pleased to say that I understand that most of the antivirus companies have posted the files needed to protect unprotected computers, and those files obviously are available at this time.

There is no evidence at this time which links this infection to the terrorist attacks of last week.

end excerpt