Chapter 9 The File destroyAll.exe: On Executing Proprietary Software 9.1 Episode May 26 The morning sun had just begun to warm MicroConnect’s headquarters when Robert entered his office and sat in his comfortable chair. Robert is happy, since everything went well with his son’s recital. A short power failure almost ruined the event but fortunately it lasted only three seconds. He contemplated on how important electric- ity has become in our everyday lives. Indeed, it seems that it is one of the most important blessings that science has given to mankind, and even his job revolved around devices that required electricity to function properly. These thoughts made him stare at the objects in his office. Every single one of them required electricity to function; the air conditioner, the lights, the television, the radio, his laptop... While staring at his laptop he remembers that he has an unfinished job to do. Just yesterday he began exploring the contents of the USB stick for discovering the mysterious girl. It’s time to abandon his philosophical thoughts about electricity. He turns on his laptop and opens the folder with the contents of the USB stick. The file labeled destroyAll.exe intrigues Robert. He knew that files having the exten- sion “exe” were executable files. However, he is wondering whether the file was indeed an executable file. Although he is very curious, and eager to double-click it for executing it, the file name makes him a bit reluctant. “I do not know what kind of application this is,” he thought. “It can be a malicious application that could delete important files from my computer making it useless, or it could even steal private information like usernames and passwords and then send them to a remote server at a future time when no suspicion would be raised,” continued the monologue. © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2018 Y. Tzitzikas, Y. Marketakis, Cinderella’s Stick, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-98488-9_9 83