HP’S CEO OF IMAGING HIT BY VIRUS

Virus Hits Joshi’s Printer Drivers At HP
New
York – Vyomesh “VJ” Joshi, executive vice president of
Hewlett-Packard’s lucrative Imaging and Printing Group, is no doubt
feeling a twinge of embarrassment.BitDefender, a Romanian antivirus
software company, discovered that a printer driver available from HP’s
Web site is infected with the very same Funlove virus that had affected
a different HP driver five years ago.Funlove was discovered in the
Korean version of the Windows 95/98 driver for the discontinued HP
Officejet g85 All-in-One printer.The pesky Funlove virus was initially
discovered in Japanese HP drivers in December 2000. Victims of Funlove
are greeted by a text message reading “Fun Loving Criminal.” Then the
virus restarts the computer and tries to change some privacy
settings.Since the HP Officejet g85 multi-function printer is no longer
on the market and most current virus protection programs are programmed
to block Funlove, very few people should be affected.And though the
slip-up is discomfiting, Joshi shouldn’t feel awkward for long. HP
reported 5% revenue growth in its second quarter earnings report in
mid-May that showed how vital Joshi’s printing division is to the
company’s well-being. Of HP’s total operating profit of $1.7 billion,
the Imaging and Printing Group brought in $1 billion .Nor should
devotees of all-in-one printers (which often have copying, scanning and
sometimes faxing capabilities) despair. HP has been quite aggressive
about its multi-function printer strategy, introducing many new models
available in both black-and-white and color .After BitDefender informed
HP of the infection, the imaging company removed the driver from its
site Thursday.