Merilhorse96V1

Merilhorse96V1 was a trojan horse created in 1996 that caused deception to computer systems at Merrill Studios by exploiting concealed information from those computers allowing the creators of the virus to take full control of those computers and disrupt functionality of those computers as well as to steal content from those computers and make profit off of the stolen content. After they were stolen, they injected a virus on the computer, causing most of them to crash and die, having to spend time rebooting them all.

The virus was responsible for a $500,000 dollar loss from Merrill Studios, which worked really hard on those movies, tv shows, and games made by the company. It lasted for 5 months, with November 6 being the official end of the trojan horse situation as the last infected computer was fixed.

The people caught were eventually arrested and charged for hacking, 10 counts of fraud, phishing, and 17 counts of criminal copyright infringement, all being sentenced to 5 years in prison for these alleged crimes. They were also sued by Merrill Studios for $12,500,000 dollars for the alleged creation of the trojan virus that caused delays in most of their work.

It also took the company many hours a day just to destroy the virus on the affected PC's, which damaged functionality of those computers, and the incomplete parts of their work had to be recovered from those computers in order to continue their business.

How It Worked
The virus was transmitted into the computer's internal hard drive, which disrupted functionality of the computers while they stole more than $500,000 dollars worth of movies, tv shows, and games. The trojan injects a computer virus that dangerously destroys the affected computer quickly and disables the cooling systems inside those computers, allowing them to overheat and potentially start fires. The computers that have been damaged by the virus were replaced with new ones that were provided to them by another company, who helps others in the worst times possible.

After the trojan horse is installed onto the computer, they would have a popup that tricked them by pretending to be ATBW and offering free help for their company. ATBW never does this to anyone and always tries to alert companies working on stuff on ATBW Blog to stay alert for scams. After many clicked yes, the trojan was placed into the computer and seized contents from those computers.