Slashdot Mirror
Writing Viruses for Fun and Profit
JMPrice writes "There's a short
article over at zdnet that explores a future synergy between viruses and spam, i.e. international crackdown on spam and open relays makes spammers opt to use infected computers instead as relays, and speculates a relationship between the virus writers and spammers."
Has it really become harder for spammers to remain anonymous ? Anyways, if it was really for spamming purposes the virus would just start open relaying.
Any spammer using this technique will be entering the realms of cyber-terrorism, and will be liable for a big prison sentence and dedicated criminal investigations. Given that spam is advertising, it probably wouldn't be very hard to track the perpetrators down once the appropriate warrants are issued. I predict that either this report is overblown, or a few spammers will end up getting the buggering they deserve in prison.
If I seem short sighted, it is because I stand on the shoulders of midgets
Seriously, how many spammers make enough money to be able to pay virus writers any decent sum for their work?
Interesting point, but you put forward the need for diversity and combine that with standards that have been implemented on many platforms. Following your line of thought we really should all be using different ways to communicate in stead of standards, to differentiate and mitigate the risk of an attack that uses one of the technologies. Standard communication protocols are just a monoculture as a "standard" operating system is. I'm more tempted to go for standards and accept the monoculture that comes with it. The "proper diversity" you're suggesting comes at the high price of losing standards; one I'm not willing to pay.
No, a standard can be implemented by people using different code bases. If the standard is faulty then it needs to be fixed and each implementation also needs to be fixed to deal with the problem. However, the vast majority of problems with standards come from there being a single code base. For example, SSH. There is code based on the original SSH implementation and code based on OpenSSH. Frequently there is a problem with one or the other but not both. Less frequently there is a problem with the standard itself.
"I have the attention span of a strobe lit goldfish, please get to the point quickly!"
So, Sobig is a worm that infects your machine and sends spam ? Let me rephrase this : Sobig is a worm that infects your *Windows* machine and sends spam.
Since Microsoft has started a crusade against Spam (to free-up bandwidth for their own humongous patches and service packs no doubt, they never do anything without a reason), shouldn't they start by fixing the very platform that makes it possible for worms to send spam ?
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
Some Spammers=Some Hackers
Today's court ruling in favor of the ISP Earthlink vs Spam Ring Leader Howard Carmack got me to thinking.
Are ALL Spammers doing it for a profit? I find that many to most SPAM emails I receive in my inbox have unresolved links. Meaning; you can't "take advantage of the DEALS you are getting". (not that you'd necessarily want to) What would be the purpose of sending out emails such as this in great quantity, and using the man hours, hardware, etc to do it?
I think it may have to do partially with "the hacker mentality" Not all hackers do things for the common mythical reasons we like to think they do. (Revenge on the corporate world, profit, fame) - they do it because they can and a lot do it because they are mentally obsessed with it.
This was the attitude of a former colleague of mine that was hacker. He came from a rich family, was very well known in the community, and had a 1000 easier ways to get what he was wanting accomplished. He was obsessed first of all with hacking, second doing it with a Macintosh, and 3rd just because he could.
I'm not alluding to hackers having a mental problem, nor really comparing hackers to spammers.
This ruling, just made me think of motivation. Maybe if we can tap the motivation for Spammers, then maybe we can come up with the solution.
Yell & scream & rant & rave... it's no use... you need a shaaaave ~ Bugs Bunny
You are on to what I have been saying for years.
If my company pays another company to advertise my product and or services and they use illegal advertising methods, then shouldn't my company be punished also?
Does it matter if my company knew about the advertising methods that would be used? I don't know anyone that would hire an advertising company without knowing what service was being provided.
Keep the Classic Slashdot.
- Examine sent items folder looking for items with attachments.
- Send another message to the same person as a follow up with an infected version of the attachement.
This would get through most of the operator suspicion filters. If the payload mutates enough to make it difficult to fingerprint it would miss virus checkers as well.Taking this into account the problem isn't the operator but an MUA/OS that allows code to be executed in such a manner. Signed documents, trusted sources, etc may help here.
You may think me a tired, old, cynic. I'd have to disagree about the tired bit.
Simply, those writing spam e-mails are trying to sell something. Spam is (for the most part, before more than now) legal. Taking over drone computers (hacking / virii) to send your spam e-mail is not. You have to make money from your business somehow. If you send spam from infected / hacked computers sending people to your website that obviously collects money for something... well, you have to have a name behind money collection. Someone has to own the paypal account or the charge vendor account... They will find you simply enough. In my mind this whole concept is bogus, as you can't hack or infect and send advertisments. That's like advertising Giant Eagle by spraypainting your daily sales on the front of buildings.
I haven't posted in so long, my sig is out of date.
Now, if they're using hacked computers, they're on the wrong side of the law. Period. We're not talking civil damages any longer. The discussion point is how long they'll be in "Federal pound-me-in-the-ass Prison".
This is the dumbest idea from a spammers viewpoint I've ever read. However, I'm not under the impression many of these guys are intelligent. The only reason they've been able to defeat filters and other mechanisms is either stupid admins or half-hearted implementations.
I personally hope they do it! I'd love to see a few spend some time in our lovely Federal Corrections Facilities.
Computer Science is Applied Philosophy