I don't think our publisher's cybersecurity courses have really taken root. In the past 30 minutes, I have installed upwards of 10 pieces of malware on my machine. The forecast is that I will install more. More free system speed optimisers. More fashion news updates. More desktop buddies. I need a thick, malicious blanket to keep my processor on its toes and some spice in my life.
I have been playing the demo for Malware, a boldly named piece of software I installed on the computer I do online banking on. Luckily, it's actually a game. To be specific, it's a puzzle game, in the same way that those file-hosting websites with eight different "DOWNLOAD!" buttons, all different colours, are puzzles.
On those sites, your goal is to find the one tiny bit of underlined text that is your actual download button, and in Malware, your goal is to navigate a series of installation wizards without installing the dirty payloads that come with them.
- An FPS studio pulled its game from Steam after it got caught linking to malware disguised as a demo, but the dev insists it was actually the victim of a labyrinthine conspiracy
- Second Steam listing this year found hiding 'new and clever' malware. This time through a fake demo link on developer's website
Its presentation is incredibly simple. You switch between your email inbox, where hapless rubes email you exe files that have hamstrung their PCs, and the exes themselves. Each one is an old-fashioned, Win98-style installation wizard. The first one is easy: Just untick the boxes asking if you want to install extra software.
The second is harder. Now some of the boxes ask if you want to not install a dodgy program, so you have to go through and make sure to only untick the right ones. The next one throws up a pop-up you need to hit the "X" on, rather than "Okay," and so on and so on, with increasingly esoteric complexity. Fail, and a chirpy popup informs you that "You have been installed X malware!"—the English is not quite perfect—where X equals every little trick you missed in the installer.
Meanwhile, in your email inbox, some sort of narrative appears to be unfolding about… time pirates emptying your bank account? And robbing other people? Not sure. All I know is that my Time and Space account got drained and I owe someone, somewhen $300,000. Thank god I can amass it in $10-$100 chunks simply by figuring out how to not install malware.
It's a tiny, simple thing—which is probably why it's currently going for $2.40 (£2) on Steam—and its demo is only tinier and simpler. But it's a cute, fun game, and reminds me of something I might once have pulled up on Newgrounds back in the heady days of 2006 or so. You know, when installers like this were more of a thing. Anyway, I can't hang about. Apparently I have a meeting with the IT department.
