Melissa (computer virus)

The Melissa virus was a fast-spreading macro virus that first appeared around March 26, 1999. The virus mainly attacked computers using Microsoft Word and Outlook.

Melissa worked by sending itself through email with Word documents from infected users. When someone opened an infected document, the virus would activate and then send itself to the first 50 people in the victim's Outlook address book. This caused huge increases in network traffic, slowing down systems worldwide. The rapid self-propagation of Melissa made it one of the most costly outbreaks at the time, and many companies had to shut down their email systems to stop its spread. Experts estimate that Melissa caused hundreds of millions of dollars in damages.