h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I have had an email from a friend of mine regarding files going around with a .pif extention... I cannot find out what this is, can you help? I would have guessed they were some sort of image file...
This friend of mine has recently been hit with a virus with a .pif extention, but it came up on a virus checker. It was too late, and 3 weeks later they are still correcting the registry and checking for all the system files.
Also, I saw in another thread about filename extentions. You can do this from within Windows: Open Windows Explorer, then go to Tools -> Folder Options, then click the File Types tab. You can then highlight the file type and click edit, changing the application the file automatically runs with.
BTW, everyone I know hates Bill Gates' guts, and I can tell you I was pleased when I heard there were hackers!!!

__
__}>===

Pif files go back to windows 3.1 and did a similar job to the shortcut files we have today (.lnk)

Bill Gates may be a thoroughly nasty chap or he may be a really decent guy, I've no idea. However, his company employs a lot of people and his products enable a lot of other companies to employ a lot of people. The trouble with black hackers is that they cost people their jobs, one way or another somebody always has to pay and whilst Bill might be unhappy at what happened it's a pound to a pinch that he won't be the one that pays for the restoration work.

Forget about Micrososft and consider a small web development company that hosts it's own sites. Any one of a dozen worms, viruses, trojans, or simple vandals exloiting dozens of security weaknesses in any operating system could put them out of business in minutes. Taking their staffs livelihoods with them. Not nice, not ethical, not anything positive - just a big ego trip and damn the consequences.

PIFs are insecure. They are miniature programmes (usually used in windows to keep information about running a DOS application). Searching for 'pif' in a virus encyclopedia will throw up dozens of hits.