When I got back from our mini-road trip to Chicago for American Thanksgiving I found that my windows workstation was infected with some kind of nasty malware. Initially from what I could see it was a type of rootkit that had taken over the machine and was using it to blast out spam to the world. From what I can tell neither the anti-virus nor anti-spyware software could detect it. So I did a google search for wgeax.exe and 2x32.exe which were the daemons that were up to no good. I found a couple of web pages from prevx.com that had some info, and was able to use the prevx software to clean my system.

The whole process got me thinking more about micro-organisms on the Internet and the ever increasing biological aspect of technology. For example, here are the listed capabilities of the software that infected my computer:

* Installs programs.
* Deletes programs.
* Invokes dll components.
* Creates Run Keys.
* Runs other programs.
* Communicates with web sites using httpout protocols.
* Has mass mail capabilities.
* Communicates with other computers across the web.
* Has outbound communications.
* Creates known malware.
* Creates copies of itself.

While all of these functions comprise the essential operation of the machine itself, it is the last that is perhaps the most poetic. I can't help but speculate at what point do these infectious pieces of code achieve sentience? At this point they require a human to tend or steward their activities, however not always, and even then, is perhaps the human in charge evolving into a new hybrid form of humanity?

I realize I'm making a bit of stretch here but I feel there's more to this than our present imaginative context allows. Often I find myself thinking there's a level of activity online that the majority of users are totally oblivious too, and perhaps the means to convey such information is the metaphor of life and evolution. Certainly if we do not make an effort to understand this new phenomena we will be consumed by our own desire for information and connectivity as it blinds us to the emerging threats of infection and corruption.