Item #: SCP-002-ND
Object Class: Euclid
Special Containment Procedures: All personnel assigned to SCP-002-ND are to receive memetic inoculation against its effects. Media outlets are to be monitored for any mention of SCP-002-ND. Foundation programmers assigned to the anomaly are tasked with developing and continually updating antiviral programs for SCP-002-ND, and to share these files via anonymous donations with any and all contactable antivirus software developers globally.
Assistance is to be provided to banks infected with SCP-002-ND via the Foundation front company "Standard Computer Products". Stage-1 infected must be detained and verbally discouraged from proceeding with their search. In case of resistance or open hostility from Stage-1 infected, the use of non-lethal force and forced amnesticization (Class-A) is authorized. Stage-2 infected (SCP-002-ND-2) must be apprehended and transported to the nearest Foundation facility for removal of anomalous materials and subsequent medical treatment (often including eye surgery). All affected individuals are to be issued Class-B amnestics once they have cleared the infection. In case the spread of SCP-002-ND reaches epidemic or greater proportions, large-scale use of amnestics is authorized.
Description: SCP-002-ND is the collective designation for a complex anomalous contagion that expresses itself with several forms. The first form of the contagion, designated SCP-002-ND-1, comprises a computer virus with strong mind-affecting and compulsive properties. It appears to have been developed in order to infiltrate the servers of various banking companies. In its inactive state, it can be identified as an executable file with the name "EttBusigtVirus.exe"1. When in its active state, it will use the host computer's Internet connection to attempt to locate and upload itself to a bank's server units, though how it is able to distinguish between regular and banking servers remains undetermined. Once uploaded, the virus will continue by locating files connected to the bank's website, before replacing and masquerading as one of them while modifying the rest2. From this point on, the bank's account software will treat SCP-002-ND as an essential file.
Once SCP-002-ND-1 has established itself, its anomalous effects will manifest upon the bank's login page. Upon an attempted login, the page will display an error message explaining the service to be malfunctioning, and provides a "further reading" collapsible detailing a suggested solution. The text underneath suggests the user should attempt to attach a blue fruit sticker to the corneosclera on each eye and the apex of their tongue, then try again. Despite the associated health risks and absurd nature of the request, approximately 80% of exposed subjects will treat the information as valid and develop a strong, compulsive need to locate and attach blue fruit stickers to themselves as outlined in the text. This changed state of mind, designated SCP-002-ND-2, has been identified as a cognitive infection, and has proven to be anomalous and directly caused by SCP-002-ND-1. In this stage, however, affected subjects are still receptive to external communication and may be helped to overcome the infection via rational arguments.
As soon as a subject suffering from SCP-002-ND-2 attaches a blue fruit sticker to any of the specified areas, brain activity will undergo radical fluctuations and become progressively reduced with each added sticker. Once all three are attached, characterized by markedly reduced brain activity and severely impaired executive brain functions, such individuals can no longer be regarded as autonomous human beings and are designated SCP-002-ND-3. Infected individuals can be characterized by the following symptoms: continuous staring, constant smiling, awkward speech patterns resembling dysprosody, and universally obsessive-compulsive behaviour by which instances of SCP-002-ND-3 attempt to propagate the contagion by either reiterating the instructions of SCP-002-ND-1 or forcibly attaching stickers to tongues and eyes of unaffected subjects. Instances of SCP-002-ND-3 seemingly have the ability to produce blue fruit stickers from nowhere.
Epidemiologically, SCP-002-ND operates in the following manner: 1) SCP-002-ND-1 (computer virus) infects a computer, exploiting its Internet connection to propagate onto other computers. A telltale sign of this is that connection speeds on the computer are perceived as sluggish, as the virus is using up the majority of the unit's bandwidth. 2) Once a bank's server computers have been infected, SCP-002-ND will use infohazardous text to transfer onto a reader's central nervous system, becoming SCP-002-ND-2 (obsessive-compulsive behaviour). 3) If or when the infected subject completes all the instructions outlined by SCP-002-ND-1, the infection progresses into SCP-002-ND-3 (mindjacking), in which the subject will lose any and all bodily autonomy and decision-making ability. The risk of contamination by SCP-002-ND-1's text has been estimated at about 80%, whereas the same risk lies around the 25% mark for SCP-002-ND-2 infectees' verbal communication and around 70% for the same by instances of SCP-002-ND-3. In 100% percent of cases where an instance of SCP-002-ND-3 had successfully attached blue fruit stickers to a previously unaffected subject, these individuals were immediately turned into instances of SCP-002-ND-3.
SCP-002-ND-2 can often easily be cured by reasoning with the infected or by the administration of amnestics. However, SCP-002-ND-3 instances can only be cured by the complete removal of all fruit stickers from the affected individual. In around 15% of all cases, the fruit stickers are placed flatly and fully glued on the instances' eyeballs, rather than being creased, complicating removal. At this stage, ocular damage is largely unavoidable, though not necessarily irreparable. Following removal, the affected individual will usually enter a comatose state for 1-2 hours, after which they will awaken with full functionality. Affected individuals retain only vague- if any- memories of their time as instances of SCP-002-ND-3, and regression is possible with all patients. Memetic inoculation has proven effective in preventing potential infections.
SCP-002-ND was discovered on 26/7/2015 following an epidemic outbreak in the Baltic Sea region. A coordinated intervention by the Foundation and the GOC prevented SCP-002-ND from spreading further, and large-scale scrubbing of international media and use of amnestics was needed to remove public knowledge of the anomaly. It is theorized that should SCP-002-ND fail to be properly contained, it would result in an AK-Class Global Madhouse scenario.