News: My Worst Month Ever

By | November 24, 2011
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 Don’t get me started on what kind of month it has been for viruses. And it’s still happening. Sophos, an anti-virus provider, today announced its monthly countdown of the ten most frequently occurring viruses and hoaxes as compiled by Sophos.
 
For August 2003, the chart is as follows, with the most frequently occurring virus at number one:
  
  1.  W32/Sobig-F        (Sobig variant)     37.6%   New Entry
  2.  W32/Blaster-A      (Blaster worm)      18.8%   New Entry
  3.  W32/Nachi-A        (Nachi worm)         5.5%   New Entry
  4.  W32/Mimail-A       (Mimail worm)        5.3%   New Entry
  5.  W32/Yaha-P         (Yaha variant)       2.1%
  6.  W32/Klez-H         (Klez variant)       1.3%   19 months in chart
  7.  W32/Bugbear-B      (Bugbear variant)    1.1%
  8.  W32/Yaha-E         (Yaha variant)       0.8%
  9.  W32/Dumaru-A       (Dumaru virus)       0.6%   New Entry
  10. W32/Sobig-A        (Sobig worm)         0.3%
 
  Others: 26.6%
 
“August 2003 will be remembered as one of the worst months in the history of computer security. A series of different viruses have bombarded computer systems around the globe, culminating in the newest member of the Sobig family, which swamped Internet email traffic and took the top position in the chart. The top four viruses are all new entries — any of which would have been number one in a normal month,” said Chris Belthoff, senior security analyst at Sophos, Inc.

News: There’s Big Money In Bugs

By | November 24, 2011
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 Just in case you were worried that the people you pay to protect you from worms and viruses may not have much incentive to stamp out the pesky bugs too successfully, here’s a new report from IDC, an IT market intelligence and advisory firm, that says the worldwide antivirus software made $2.2 billion last year — 31% more than 2001. IDC believes growth will continue over the next five years, reaching $4.4 billion in 2007, as protection against virus and worm attacks remains a top priority for corporations and greater awareness fuels consumer spending.
 
Now of course I’m not saying that these guys are making the viruses and worms. But I do think there’s got to be a better way to stop viruses than all this subscription-to-updates stuff. Thoughts anyone?

News: Barcodes Fight Back

By | November 24, 2011
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 I love this idea. The New York Times reports that James Patten, a graduate student in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Media Lab, has come up with a digital tool that can scan the bar code printed on nearly any product, and indicate whether its corporate pedigree is blemished. The Corporate Fallout Detector “combines a bar-code reader with an internal database of pollution complaints and ethics violations packed in a casing resembling a cold-war-era Geiger counter”.
 
Marc Smith, a research sociologist at Microsoft, has meanwhile “been developing a similar device, combining a bar-code scanner, a hand-held computer and wireless Internet access. In a grocery store near a cafe that was promoting a Wi-Fi hot spot, he tested a box of cereal by scanning the bar code and letting the computer nose around on the Internet. It turned out that the cereal had been recalled because its label failed to mention the presence of nuts, a potential hazard to people with allergies.”
 
Both great ideas, but why stop there. You could use barcodes — or their more powerful successors, RFID tags — to hook up with data such as other consumer comments, cheaper products elsewhere, or whatever. Suddenly the tags and barcodes that empower retailers may end up empowering the consumer…

I’m Not Saying Worms Are A Good Idea But…

By | November 24, 2011
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 One small consolation of worms like Sobig is that you end up having a large number of inadvertent penpals. It’s like a huge chainletter. Sobig ransacks address books and fires off emails to all and sundry, along with the worm (which then does lots of damage, I’m not contesting).
 
While I don’t condone the activities of silly anti-virus vendors who haven’t figured out that worms like Sobig fake the sender of emails (see my earlier posting on this) — making the sending of automated emails to the apparent senders of worms an absurd and self-defeating endeavour — it’s kinda interesting to get emails from servers around the globe in places that you couldn’t possibly know anyone. I just got one from Romania complaining I sent someone called Deico an infected email. I have never been to Romania, and as far as I know I have never corresponded with someone from Romania. But someone I know must, or someone they know. Or someone they know. Or someone they know….

I’m Not Saying Worms Are A Good Idea But…

By | November 24, 2011
0 Comment
 One small consolation of worms like Sobig is that you end up having a large number of inadvertent penpals. It’s like a huge chainletter. Sobig ransacks address books and fires off emails to all and sundry, along with the worm (which then does lots of damage, I’m not contesting).
 
While I don’t condone the activities of silly anti-virus vendors who haven’t figured out that worms like Sobig fake the sender of emails (see my earlier posting on this) — making the sending of automated emails to the apparent senders of worms an absurd and self-defeating endeavour — it’s kinda interesting to get emails from servers around the globe in places that you couldn’t possibly know anyone. I just got one from Romania complaining I sent someone called Deico an infected email. I have never been to Romania, and as far as I know I have never corresponded with someone from Romania. But someone I know must, or someone they know. Or someone they know. Or someone they know….