Posted by
CmdrTaco
on from the no-surprise-there dept.
quakeslut writes "It's Feb. 1st everyone... and all of you who have been reading Slashdot know that today MyDoom.A begins it's attack... according to Reuters, SCO has already been hit hard. Stay tuned for Tuesday when MyDoom.B hits Microsoft..."
I wish it wouldn't happen. This virus is painting the Linux community as a bunch of petulant adolescents - regardless of who's doing it.
I'm trying to remember who in the Linux community was quoted in the Wall Street Journal as saying "Let's take the high road." We should do just that. We all know that SCO doesn't have a leg to stand on. Let's let them sink themsleves.
--
There is no spoon or sig.
Re:Finally!
by
Anonymous Coward
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
This virus is painting the Linux community as a bunch of petulant adolescents - regardless of who's doing it.
No, it's not. The media (and SCO, et al for obvious reasons) is painting the F/OSS community as adolescents
What they didn't include in the article
by
marsu_k
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
Curiously, this article seems to imply that there was a political agenda behind DDoSing SCO - but to quote Mikko Hypponen of F-secure a bit more:
"It's also possible the attack against SCO is just a smokescreen to misdirect attention away from the backdoor component in the virus - which is most likely included in order to facilitate sending of spam email messages."
Similiar, albeit longer, quote from him asserting that indeed spammers were behind this worm was in the local newspaper on Friday, but it's in Finnish and I'm too lazy to translate it. But the above quote can be found here.
Yes, it's a classic trick, and it's worked for thousands of years. I'ts worked for politicians and armies. It's worked for the con-artist and the cult leader. What is this trick? Miss-direction. If you think that this virus has anything at all to do with the open source community or SCO then your not keeping your eye on the ball sparky!
1. This virus makes a machine an open relay. Considering recent legislation and other anti-spam techniques I smell spammer bovine feces here.
3. The open source community is coming up with various anti-spam measures. Don't you think the spammers would love painting their enemy as petulant child - as they have proven themselves to be?
MyDOOM isn't the open source community pissing on on SCO, it's spammers pissing on all of us.
-- "Science is about ego as much as it is about discovery and truth " - I said it, so sue me.
SCO website just a symbol...
by
bangular
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
Realistically, who the hell even goes to the SCO website. They've got so few new potential customers anyway (I would put the number at zero). Current UnixWare users doubtfully visit their website very much anyway.
Their website being down is more of a symbol. A symbol to them of "Look at what they are doing to us". It's obviously not very important to them anyway seeing as how in the past they've taken it down for hours to days at a time for "server upgrades". If it were that critical to them, they wouldn't have had downtime. But it was cheaper to take it down and do what they needed to do to spend the money to keep it up during upgrades.
Anyway, SCO can eat apple sauce out of my ass with a spoon.
Telling people not to voice their opionions because of fear of what other people might think of you is an asinine way to excersice your right to free speech.
Yes, free speech is something we believe in at slashdot as well. We can and should make jokes. Why? Because we always make jokes about things! I would make a joke right now, but (1) I'm not that funny, and (2) I'm just too shocked that I am being told in a +5 comment not to say something.
Let the media report what they will. The fact is, some part of the community that you posted to can find humour in this. We are for sure a community that finds humour in everything.
Actually, now that I read your comment again, I am not sure you are serious. Perhaps it was just a joke and our mods have modded you insightfull?
Re:How did this virus spread so easily?
by
glesga_kiss
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
For the past 4 versions of Windows Microsoft has refused to remove a huge security hole called file extension hiding.
Bollocks. The people commonly infected with viruses wouldn't even know what a file extension was, let alone the difference between an exe and a txt file.
"The one with the W is a word file, the portrait is a graphic file etc". Give a file "virus.exe" the same icon graphic as a word file, and most users wouldn't know the difference.
On the other hand, if you don't hide the extension, then each of us here would be constantly dealing with dumb users who have renamed "Document1.doc" to "Report" (no extension). For 99% of users, hiding extensions is a good idea.
Slashdot Mirror
Sunday isn't even a business day? How much money will they not lose?
Jonathanjk.com
I'm trying to remember who in the Linux community was quoted in the Wall Street Journal as saying "Let's take the high road." We should do just that. We all know that SCO doesn't have a leg to stand on. Let's let them sink themsleves.
There is no spoon or sig.
This virus is painting the Linux community as a bunch of petulant adolescents - regardless of who's doing it.
No, it's not. The media (and SCO, et al for obvious reasons) is painting the F/OSS community as adolescents
Curiously, this article seems to imply that there was a political agenda behind DDoSing SCO - but to quote Mikko Hypponen of F-secure a bit more:
"It's also possible the attack against SCO is just a smokescreen to misdirect attention away from the backdoor component in the virus - which is most likely included in order to facilitate sending of spam email messages."
Similiar, albeit longer, quote from him asserting that indeed spammers were behind this worm was in the local newspaper on Friday, but it's in Finnish and I'm too lazy to translate it. But the above quote can be found here.
1. This virus makes a machine an open relay. Considering recent legislation and other anti-spam techniques I smell spammer bovine feces here.
2. More and more spammers used high jacked machines for DNS, web service as well as relaying their crap. spammers Check out the nanae news group for more examples
3. The open source community is coming up with various anti-spam measures. Don't you think the spammers would love painting their enemy as petulant child - as they have proven themselves to be?
MyDOOM isn't the open source community pissing on on SCO, it's spammers pissing on all of us.
AngryPeopleRule
"Science is about ego as much as it is about discovery and truth " - I said it, so sue me.
Realistically, who the hell even goes to the SCO website. They've got so few new potential customers anyway (I would put the number at zero). Current UnixWare users doubtfully visit their website very much anyway.
Their website being down is more of a symbol. A symbol to them of "Look at what they are doing to us". It's obviously not very important to them anyway seeing as how in the past they've taken it down for hours to days at a time for "server upgrades". If it were that critical to them, they wouldn't have had downtime. But it was cheaper to take it down and do what they needed to do to spend the money to keep it up during upgrades.
Anyway, SCO can eat apple sauce out of my ass with a spoon.
Is this a troll?
Telling people not to voice their opionions because of fear of what other people might think of you is an asinine way to excersice your right to free speech.
Yes, free speech is something we believe in at slashdot as well. We can and should make jokes. Why? Because we always make jokes about things! I would make a joke right now, but (1) I'm not that funny, and (2) I'm just too shocked that I am being told in a +5 comment not to say something.
Let the media report what they will. The fact is, some part of the community that you posted to can find humour in this. We are for sure a community that finds humour in everything.
Actually, now that I read your comment again, I am not sure you are serious. Perhaps it was just a joke and our mods have modded you insightfull?
Bollocks. The people commonly infected with viruses wouldn't even know what a file extension was, let alone the difference between an exe and a txt file.
"The one with the W is a word file, the portrait is a graphic file etc". Give a file "virus.exe" the same icon graphic as a word file, and most users wouldn't know the difference.
On the other hand, if you don't hide the extension, then each of us here would be constantly dealing with dumb users who have renamed "Document1.doc" to "Report" (no extension). For 99% of users, hiding extensions is a good idea.