EICAR is officially 15 years old today!
For many people, EICAR is best known for the EICAR test file, an industry-standard anti-malware test file that can be used to confirm that anti-malware software is installed and working correctly. Preceded by an inaugural meeting of international experts in 1990 and initiated by Dr. Alan Solomon, the following people met on 27th September 1991 at the Cultural Centre Auderghem, in Brussels, Belgium and founded the 'European Institute for Computer Anti Virus Research' abbreviated as EICAR:
Vesselin Bontchev (Bulgaria), Bruno Imhasly (Switzerland), Dr. Jean Bernard Condat (France), Mark Murry Danton (Southafrica), Rüdiger Dierstein (Germany), Paul Ducklin (Southafrica), Frans Veldmann (The Netherlands), David Ferbrache (Great Britain), Christoph Fischer (Germany), Derek Giroulle (Belgium), Günther von Gravenreuth (Germany), Roger Gustafsson (Sweden), Tjark Auerbach (Germany), Christian Schmidt (Austria), Dr. Paul Langemeyer (Germany), Ian Melamed (Southafrica), Anthony Naggs (Great Britain), Dr. Christian Schneider (Germany), Günther Mußtopf (Germany), Roger Riordan (Australia), Dr. Alan Solomon (Great Britain), Franz Swoboda (Austria), Heinz Trenker (Germany), Theo Lieven (Germany), Michael Weiner (Austria), David Steelman (United States of America), Matthias Vanselow (Germany), Eddy Willems - That's me! -(Belgium), and Christian Schmidt (Austria).
Professor Klaus Brunnstein from the University Hamburg, Germany, also one of the experts and pioneers of the first hour, though never a registered member, chaired the assembly of the founding members.
I must say that I nearly forgot this date until I saw the mentioning of it at http://www.viruslist.com/en/weblog
the Analyst's Diary of Kaspersky Lab. But they think we have been founded a little bit earlier. Of course it depends from which date you are counting and I am counting from the official founding date. ;-)