The fast-spreading virus started to attack the global network at about 1:00 pm Beijing time on Saturday and damaged the Internet in Australia, the United States and Asia.

The virus, which was detected several hours after it struck the networks, caused a marked slowdown in e-mail and other online transmissions, according to China's virus supervision department.

Huang Chengqing, secretary-general of the Internet Society of China (ISC), said it took emergency measures, and got control by 9:30 pm on Saturday.

Known as the "worm virus," the malicious program took advantage of a previously identified weakness in Microsoft SQL Server 2000 software, shutting down the SQL database on the Web.

The virus is a small program that could quickly copy itself and send rapid data requests in search of other servers that manage computer networks.

The damage came from the way it overwhelmed networks by quickly cloning itself and spreading to other servers.

"The exact origin of the attack remains unknown," said Huang. "But what is for sure is that most of the Asian countries, especially South Korea, have been seriously affected."

South Korea, one of the world's most wired countries, appears to be the biggest victim of the virus.

South Korea issued an Internet security alert Sunday after the virus crippled all its online services.

According to South Korea's Information and Communication Ministry, the vicious virus broke down the country's broadband and mobile Internet services on Saturday. Only 10 percent of the nation's network remained operational.

Unlike other viruses, the worm did not infect individual desktop computers. Huang added: "The individual netizen may feel the slowness in surfing the Internet, but there will be no damage to personal computers."

Slow download speeds and the failure to access websites will have some negative impact on the Web-based services such as online shopping and banking.

Several major websites in Beijing experienced disruption on Saturday afternoon, but the situation returned more or less to normal Sunday.

Some netizens complained about the slow traffic and difficulty in accessing some popular foreign websites.

With most people not at work during the weekend, the virus seemed not to have much effect on people's daily work.

In the warning jointly released Sunday by the China Computer Emergency Response Team Coordination Centre and ISC, Internet users and dealers have been urged to be on the alert for the further attack of the virus.

(China Daily January 27, 2003)