A laptop with six of the world's most dangerous viruses has been sold for over $1million
It's "The Persistence of Chaos", by the artist Guo O Dong
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May 28th, 2019
May 28th, 2019
Usually, when a virus infects the computer an ordinary person despairs and if he spends money, he does it only to eliminate the uninvited guest. It may, therefore, sound very strange that a 2008 Samsung NC10-14GB 10.2-inch laptop containing six of the world's most dangerous virus viruses was auctioned off for $1.345 million. The whole thing becomes clearer when we consider that the object is actually a work of art entitled The Persistence of Chaos (TPC) made by Guo O Dong. The creative explained to The Verge the reflection behind the project:
“We have this fantasy that things that happen in computers can’t actually affect us, but this is absurd. Weaponized viruses that affect power grids or public infrastructure can cause direct harm.”
The work, as the official website says, "was created as a collaboration between the artist and computer security company Deep Instinct, which provided the malware and technical expertise to perform the work in a protected environment. The viruses contained inside Samsung, all guilty of having caused particularly serious damage to the computer infrastructure of companies and institutions around the world (estimated at about $ 95 billion in total), are: ILOVEYOU, MyDoom (defined as "one of the fastest spreading worms" that alone caused financial trouble for $38 billion), SoBig, DarkTequila, BlackEnergy and WannaCry, an extremely virulent ransomware crypto worm that has affected more than 200,000 computers in 150 countries. The questions that remain now are two: Is TPC art or just yet another sterile (and expensive) provocation? What will the auction winner do with this virus-filled laptop?
