From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:
Trojan horse \Tro"jan horse`\, n. [from the incident described
in Homer's Iliad.]
1. (Classical mythology) a large hollow wooden horse built by
Greek soldiers besieging Troy during the Trojan War, and
left as a "gift" when they pretended to abandon their
seige. It was taken into the city by the Trojans, and
Greek soldiers concealed inside came out and opened the
gates to the city, enabling the capture of the city by the
Greeks.
[RP + PJC]
2. Hence, any thing or person which appears harmless but is
designed to destroy or attack from within. It may
sometimes refer to a group; -- see also {fifth column}.
[RP + PJC]
3. (Computers) A computer program designed to evade the
security precautions within a computer system and perform
illicit operations, or to do malicious damage, and often
designed to look like a different kind of program, such as
a game, archiver, or directory lister. This term is not
applied to a program that replicates itself, such as a
{virus}.
[RP + PJC]
From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:
fifth column \fifth` col"umn\, n. [from a statement during the
Spanish Civil War (1936) that the Falange had four columns of
soldiers marching on the city, and a fifth column "already
there" (i.e. sympathizers inside the Republican lines).]
1. a group of persons inside the battle lines of a territory
engaged in a conflict, who secretly sympathize with the
enemy, and who engage in espionage or sabotage; --
sometimes also referred to as a {trojan horse}.
[RP]
2. Hence, any faction of persons within a group who secretly
sympathize with an enemy, especially those who engage in
activities harmful to the group; an enemy in one's midst;
a group of traitors.
[RP]
From WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006) [wn]:
Trojan horse
n 1: a subversive group that supports the enemy and engages in
espionage or sabotage; an enemy in your midst [syn: {fifth
column}, {Trojan horse}]
2: a program that appears desirable but actually contains
something harmful; "the contents of a trojan can be a virus
or a worm"; "when he downloaded the free game it turned out
to be a trojan horse" [syn: {trojan}, {trojan horse}]
3: a large hollow wooden figure of a horse (filled with Greek
soldiers) left by the Greeks outside Troy during the Trojan
War [syn: {Trojan Horse}, {Wooden Horse}]
From The Jargon File (version 4.4.7, 29 Dec 2003) [jargon]:
Trojan horse
n.
[coined by MIT-hacker-turned-NSA-spook Dan Edwards] A malicious
security-breaking program that is disguised as something benign, such as a
directory lister, archiver, game, or (in one notorious 1990 case on the
Mac) a program to find and destroy viruses! See {back door}, {virus},
{worm}, {phage}, {mockingbird}.
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