M$ has surrendered to the Blaster worm

Originally posted by fryke
Well, what exactly would YOU have done, if you knew in advance that a few thousand computers were going to attack your server(s)? Exactly, you'd have let the worm run into a void, just as MS has done. What MS had done is only to step aside while the danger is present. Windows Update will be restored after that.

First, this is a really good question. I would have kept the site up and added a mirror site so people could still get the stuff they needed. Show that I was big enough to take it on the chin and was still standing after it was done.

Microsoft's solution show the people that write this stuff can get companies (even as big as Microsoft) to retreat from their associated domain names.

And no, the domain isn't coming back any time soon. The worm is set to attack on the 16th of every month from now on. Microsoft and/or Windows users need to clean this up enough to the point where the number of attacks each month is less than would initiate a DOS situation for that domain name.

The point is, while Microsoft is patting itself on the back for dropping the domain name, they have just made DOS attacks like this one a successful and effective tool for virus/worm writers.
 
My question is, where are the cool names?
It is great to be able to bring a corporation down to its knee's, but bugbear and blaster are horrible names.

How about name them after characters:
Devastator, Unicron(not unicorn), Nemesis Enforcer, Boomstick(evil dead reference)

It would put fear into an already doomed pc user and shed some light on a worm/virus creator's creativity.

I guess these viruses are not important afterall.
 
How else will Symantec stay in business? :)

I don't see why they couldn't move their servers, like to a different IP address or change the appropriate URL's, and redirect the worm's traffic to a nonexistent location.
 
i think its funny that they released a patch for it a month ago and yet everyone still jumps on the "its all MS' fault"

don't act like OSX doesnt have security holes, if it was running on 95% percent of the machines out there we would be feeling every last one of those holes as well.
 
Originally posted by Jason
i think its funny that they released a patch for it a month ago and yet everyone still jumps on the "its all MS' fault"

don't act like OSX doesnt have security holes, if it was running on 95% percent of the machines out there we would be feeling every last one of those holes as well.
That's the whore's defense: "All those men don't f**k me because I'm a whore, they f**k me because I'm popular." I wouldn't believe it from my girlfriend, and I don't buy it from M$. What is particularly galling about the Blaster worm is that is is a "cut and paste" worm cobbled together from pieces of other malicious code.

The bottomline is that M$ Windows is an enabling technology for malicious code. Before Windows (and to a large degree, M$ Office), such malicious code required the services of skilled programmers. M$ has lowered the barrier to entry to the novice programmer. It is true that all systems have flaws. However, M$ software has orders of magnitude more of them. M$ has also made them orders of magnitude easier to exploit.
 
Originally posted by Krisneph
My friend of mine got the virus and said it took him 5 min to disable it, but i'm pretty sure he lied. He was like, "Hey did you get the virus ....oh that's right you use a Mac."

I had a little talk with him, and he's actually considering a Mac for his next computer

Yeah, my bro got the virus too. It took me a little while longer than 5 mins to fix it as his pc kept crashing whilst downloading the windows update patch - and he's on 56k so it was slow anyway. The little symantec patch was good though. I'd installed norton on his machine but he wasnt patched to close the hole. Norton knew it was there but could do nowt about it.
 
there was a way to avoid the system shutdown every thirty seconds, it involved going into xp or whichever's console thing and telling it not to shutdown. then you are free to work until the problem is solved...
 
On the bright side, a new revision of the worm has been circulating that cleans up blaster worm. It's almost like a halmark commercial... virus becoming benevolent and cleaning up after it's kin.
 
Well, when you hear the hairdresser talking about it while they're cutting your hair, you KNOW this thing is big.
 
Originally posted by Jason
i think its funny that they released a patch for it a month ago and yet everyone still jumps on the "its all MS' fault"

don't act like OSX doesnt have security holes, if it was running on 95% percent of the machines out there we would be feeling every last one of those holes as well.

Come on Jason! Even IT pros cannot keep up with the patches and updates that M$ throwing out of the Windows Update gates! Still, you want the average Joe to keep up? If you think that all this mess is not M$ fault then... hmmmmm :rolleyes:

No matter how you put it Jason with what if? scenarios Apple isn't at M$'s position... ::ha::

And let's just never forget the billions that M$ is earning each and every year... Instead of making gaming consoles, watches, mice, whatever, they should have produce MORE secure OSes at least in the past 4-5 years if not earlier... :mad:

As of now, OS X is bullet proof compared to Windows... ANY Windows version! Dare to go for a round with Critical Updates from M$ against Security Updates from Apple even for only the past 6 months? What about Viruses? Worms? :rolleyes:

Oh, and Jason, if Apple was in the 95% of the market the computing world would be so much better... If you remember M$ wasn't from the beginning 95%... Even back then when they were 5% or less they produced crap software compared to other companies of that era! Dare to compare Amiga OS, Acorn OS, Atari OS against Windows 1.0? :p And that's before we swim into the dark waters of their apps at that time...

M$ is SO unTrusty Computing platform that is damn scary no matter in how many what-if scenarios you may want to indulge us into... :D

Oh, and people here is another interesting reading...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3154479.stm
 
i guess im not an average joe, because by simply checking the update site once a week i kept up rather easily... wow.... what amazement!
 
I guess then that you are not! Good for you that your are still get the chance to amaze yourself while using Windows... :p

Then again if it was THAT easy then all those millions of Joes would not have the Blaster worked them THAT hard, would they? :rolleyes:

Then again we talk about the Dark Side Joes... :p

Oh, and Jason change your user name into The Amazing Jason :D
 
Microsoft is a very sad company... they are one of the biggest names in the technology industry, yet half of what they make is crap and the other half doesn't work all the time.
 
Originally posted by hulkaros
...

Oh, and Jason, if Apple was in the 95% of the market the computing world would be so much better... If you remember M$ wasn't from the beginning 95%... Even back then when they were 5% or less they produced crap software compared to other companies of that era! Dare to compare Amiga OS, Acorn OS, Atari OS against Windows 1.0? :p And that's before we swim into the dark waters of their apps at that time...

M$ is SO unTrusty Computing platform that is damn scary no matter in how many what-if scenarios you may want to indulge us into... :D

Oh, and people here is another interesting reading...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3154479.stm


OUCH jason...
...that gotta hurt :)
 
Maybe M$ should use an Xserve farm for the task. Seems less likely to get hit with those nasty Windows viruses hitting the net now-a-days. :)
 
Hey Microsoft, why don't you go all the way and release the actual code that will exploit those security breaches? I mean, it's bad enough that you're telling us of places that hackers can get in, meaning they'll probably try to exploit it now that they know about it; why not release that code and give the average non-programmer Joe a chance to exploit your stupid flaws too?

Evildan: The problem isn't the servers themselves, it's all the bandwidth they'll have to dish out once the worm makes all the infected computers target Microsoft's site. Xserve server farms can go down just as easily as any other with enough hits.
 
Since I am forced to have a windoze pc to do some of my work, I decided to patch M$'s latest flaws. It only took 16!!!! friggin hours to download the 3 patchs and install them.
HA!!!!!

And we expect our technopeasants to perform this update?!?

Last week was quite funny. The University that I work for was completely shut down for 1.5 days because of this M$ worm junk.
I was the only person who could get any work done because I use a Mac.
I was also the "savior" of the day because I was able to download the patch for M$blast and distribute it to our users.
After the latest Sobig attack, 6 technopeasants hit despite repeated warnings to not open .pif files, my organization is looking at buying more Macs.

I think I see a shiny new G5 in my future;)
 
Yay! Hail the conquering hero...

I'm always amazed at how stupid people can be. Even after being told multiple times not to do something for the sake of their own wellbeing, they do it anyway and end up complaining about it. You should have told those people to reformat their computers because they didn't listen.
 
Well I guess we are better off us "Mac" to stay within the 5% of the market so virus programmers can still concentrate into the 95% PC users this is the best antivirus ever. So before you convince someone to switch think twice:))
The downside is that sofware developper won't work too much on mac version if the market don't continue to increase.
just a thought.

Giro
 
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