Tag: Tech Time Warp

Tech Time Warp is a weekly feature that looks back at interesting moments and milestones in tech history.

Tech Time Warp
Tech Time Warp: History of the first case of ransomware

Tech Time Warp: History of the first case of ransomware

In this week’s Tech Time Warp, we look at the recent cybersecurity news out of Las Vegas sounds like something from Ocean’s 11, no matter whether your taste runs to Frank Sinatra or George Clooney: two of the world’s largest...

/ September 22, 2023
Tech Time Warp
Tech Time Warp: Nimda worm slows traffic with multiple propagation methods

Tech Time Warp: Nimda worm slows traffic with multiple propagation methods

In this week’s Tech Time Warp, we look back to September 2001. While the world was reeling from the 9/11 terrorist attacks, hackers unleashed a new threat: a worm that could modify existing websites to trick users into downloading malware....

/ September 15, 2023
Tech Time Warp
Tech Time Warp: Woz dabbles in music festivals

Tech Time Warp: Woz dabbles in music festivals

In this week’s Tech Time Warp we discuss how we all know Steve Wozniak as the co-founder of Apple—but did you know Woz also dabbled in rock festivals? Forty-one years ago, while on hiatus from Apple after a plane crash,...

/ September 1, 2023
Tech Time Warp
Tech Time Warp: Why the Panix attack was a wake-up call

Tech Time Warp: Why the Panix attack was a wake-up call

In this week’s Tech Time Warp, we take a look at how a work emergency is never good news—and when notice of it comes late on a Friday afternoon, it’s even worse. Especially when the news is that your internet...

/ August 25, 2023
Tech Time Warp
Tech Time Warp: Worm named Code Red wakes users up to security risks

Tech Time Warp: Worm named Code Red wakes users up to security risks

In this week’s tech time warp we look at how, following a month of DDoS attacks and security bulletins—including an attack on whitehouse.gov—computer users were on high alert Aug. 1, 2001, as they waited to see whether the Code Red...

/ August 4, 2023
Tech Time Warp
Tech Time Warp: Barbie’s complicated relationship with STEM

Tech Time Warp: Barbie’s complicated relationship with STEM

In this week’s tech time warp, we’re taking a look at Barbie—yes, the iconic doll turned blockbuster movie heroine. She has had a complicated relationship with science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) would be an understatement. Teen Talk Barbie, released...

/ July 28, 2023
tech time warp
Tech Time Warp: How human error leads to July 1997 email outage

Tech Time Warp: How human error leads to July 1997 email outage

This week’s Tech Time Warp looks at how, in a world that’s so utterly reliant on the internet, service outages are hardly uncommon anymore, whether they’re the result of distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks, like that which caused Microsoft...

/ July 21, 2023
Tech Time Warp
Tech Time Warp: Tron captivates audiences with 15 minutes of CGI

Tech Time Warp: Tron captivates audiences with 15 minutes of CGI

As with all things technological, it’s easy to take computer-generated imagery, or CGI, for granted—or even complain about CGI, in the case of the much-maligned CGI Flounder from Disney’s recent remake of The Little Mermaid. But in this week’s Tech...

/ July 7, 2023
Tech Time Warp
Tech Time Warp: Malware in the “Form” of a boot sector virus

Tech Time Warp: Malware in the “Form” of a boot sector virus

Although this week’s Tech Time Warp topic is not as prevalent today, boot sector viruses were a widespread issue in the 1990s and 2000s. Especially common during the days of MS-DOS and floppy disks, a boot sector virus attacks a...

/ June 30, 2023
Tech Time Warp
Tech Time Warp: 80s viruses that hit the Apple II

Tech Time Warp: 80s viruses that hit the Apple II

Apple products have a reputation for being immune to malware, but that is not 100 percent true. In 1988, hackers released two viruses targeting ProDOS, the Apple II operating system. Admittedly, it took hackers five years to attack ProDOS —...

/ June 23, 2023