The hacker who created a widely reported cross-platform virus that could affect both Windows and Linux PCs may have inadvertently done some free bug testing for the Linux operating system. Linux creator Linus Torvalds said on Wednesday he had patched his operating system kernel to fix a bug that had been preventing the virus from running.
The virus, called Virus.Linux.Bi.a/ Virus.Win32.Bi.a, was first reported by security vendor Kaspersky Lab Ltd. on April 7, which labeled it an interesting proof of concept program, because of its ability to affect both Windows and Linux.