Internet worm fizzles

SINGAPORE - The dreaded Code Red computer virus left the Internet largely unscathed yesterday, with some experts congratulating themselves on catching the worm before it turned and others dismissing it as a false alarm.

Computer experts saw no immediate effect from the Code Red worm that was expected to wind its way through web servers from the stroke of August 1, but they cautioned that more time was needed to assess its full impact.

The worm - a software virus that affects computers running certain types of Microsoft's operating systems - has struck twice before, hitting hundreds of thousands of computers.

But millions of computer users appeared better prepared this time, armed with a free software patch that catches the worm.

"It's something like the Y2K bug because everyone was prepared," said Ravi Venkatesam, vice-president of operations at Atesto Technologies in California.

The US Government, which appeared to be the target of previous attacks by the virus, said it had not been affected and Asian Governments told a similar story.

Even China - an early suspect because of a message initially flashed on some screens - was unaffected. The state-run Computer Virus Treatment Centre in Tianjin said it had heard of no cases by noon yesterday. Code Red bombards websites with a crippling amount of traffic, making them inaccessible to legitimate users.

It attacks computers running Microsoft's Windows NT and Windows 2000 operating systems.