Scaremongering scientist claims to have infected himself with computer virus

A British scientist at the University of Reading is claiming to be the first human to be “infected with a computer virus”.

According to a report on BBC News, Dr Mark Gasson, a senior research fellow working at the university’s Cybernetic Intelligence Research Group, implanted an RFID chip containing what he claimed to be virus code into his hand.

You can see Dr Gasson describing what he has done in this video report by BBC technology correspondent Rory Cellan-Jones:

Well done to Dr Gasson for getting some media exposure for his department, but this really is shonky research in my opinion.

Yes, you could put software code on an RFID chip that you could put in your body (or your cat, as some Dutch researchers…

Read more in my article on the Naked Security website.

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Graham Cluley •   @gcluley

Graham Cluley is a veteran of the anti-virus industry having worked for a number of security companies since the early 1990s when he wrote the first ever version of Dr Solomon's Anti-Virus Toolkit for Windows. Now an independent security analyst, he regularly makes media appearances and is an international public speaker on the topic of computer security, hackers, and online privacy. Follow him on Twitter at @gcluley, on Mastodon at @[email protected], or drop him an email.