Snow Crash

Snow Crash

A computer virus created by Valentino August and modified by Efan Orm Radashe which basically mimics the effects of a low-scale electromagnetic pulse, disabling and sometimes damaging electronics and cyberware. Snow Crash is unique in that instead of being composed of code which infects other systems, it consists of electrical pulses which tell the system to rewrite its own code and perpetuate the pulse. Since the pulses can be passed on through the visible light spectrum, it is possible for the virus to pass between systems through video links and visual cyberware as well as by direct transmission.

The effect of Snow Crash is to scramble data and replace the visual output of any system it infects with a kind of static which also contains the pulse code of the virus--so anyone with cyber eyes or implant computers who looks at a screen full of the static will acquire the virus just by a glance. This is what makes the virus especially dangerous, since it is capable of sending anyone equipped with this sort of cyberware into epileptic fits.

Efan Orm Radashe, after unwittingly unleashing the virus over half of Kingston, created another set of programmed pulses that would counteract the effect of the virus (although not prevent its spread). He later created another version of Snow Crash that would erase the progenitor code either upon remote command or after a set time, enabling the virus' use as a tactical weapon.

Rigging Value: Impossible
Legality: Proscribed
Availability: Rare
Cost: 26,000cs