Christopher Pile (born , also known as "the Black Baron") is a
programmer
A computer programmer, sometimes referred to as a software developer, a software engineer, a programmer or a coder, is a person who creates computer programs — often for larger computer software.
A programmer is someone who writes/creates ...
who was sentenced to 18 months in jail in 1995 for creating and spreading two
computer virus
A computer virus is a type of computer program that, when executed, replicates itself by modifying other computer programs and inserting its own code. If this replication succeeds, the affected areas are then said to be "infected" with a compu ...
es called Pathogen and Queeg. While Pile was not the first person convicted for creating and spreading computer viruses, his case was the first "widely covered and published computer crime case that ended in a jail sentence"
as well as the first such case to be prosecuted in England and Wales.
In addition to the two viruses, he also created
Smeg (short for "Simulated Metamorphic Encryption enGine"
), a software tool that he used to hide Pathogen and Queeg from the antivirus software of the time. Smeg was written in a way that allowed it to be also used by others to hide and spread their own viruses.
References
External links
Article from ''Crypt Magazine'' on Pile, 1996
of the methods behind a polymorph engine, written by Pile under his ''Black Baron'' guise.
Chris Piles' Asteroids emulator for PCsA page about Chris Pile's software for Z80-based computersDefender, Chris Piles' Defender Game for the Sam Coupe
{{DEFAULTSORT:Pile, Chris
1969 births
Living people
Place of birth missing (living people)
English computer programmers
British cybercriminals
Prisoners and detainees of England and Wales