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Internet Meltdown Predicted for Tomorrow
Kobalt writes "A few news services are reporting that Russian computer expert, Aleksandr Gostev from Kaspersky Labs, has predicted that a large chunk of the Internet will be shut down tomorrow by cyber terrorists."
How can they know? unless they are somehow involved.....
He just wants to sell you his anti-virus!
From Mosnews""Speaking at a conference hosted by Russian Information Agency Novosti, Aleksandr Gostev from Kaspersky Labs said information on this terrorist attack was published on special websites. He did not elaborate."
What kind of attack, what 'special websites', what equipment or service is being attacked, what vulnerabilities does it exploit, etc, ad nasuem.
Cripes, give us some sort of information, is the sky falling or isn't it?
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Armed with this foreknowledge, what can we do besides wait and see what happens? One of TFAs stated that there's really nothing we can do to defend against the attack, so what's the point in worrying about it? Either it will happen, and folks in the US and Western Europe will be inconvenienced, or it won't happen, and we'll all have worried for nothing. At this point, it seems like this knowledge, while nice to have, is somewhat useless.
Also, why tomorrow? Wouldn't it send a more powerful message to wait a few weeks and do it on September 11th?
This sig has been stolen. Return it to its original user for a reward.
The sun may or may not go nova this week.
I may or may not get myself a real girlfriend.
there may or may not be dupes posted on our beloved
Kevin Mitnick may or may not like chicken.
You may or may not get that raise (job, for those unemployed) this week.
It's easy to make
Ha! They've been trying to get this administration to truly define a 'terrorist' period. Good luck with 'cyber-terrorist'!
Your guess is as good as anyone elses!
If you're in the US, it's anyone the current government doesn't like who also happens to own or have access to a computer.
--
I've personally become entirely jaded by the term 'terrorist'. I've heard it used to describe just about everything that the speaker wants to scare you into believing.
Officials of foreign governments are now terrorists, drinking a Pepsi at the Olympics is "advertising terrorism", etc.
As Reagan said; one mans terrorist is another mans freedom fighter.
Why couldn't he have said this months ago? I could have gotten another cushy job protecting computers against doomsday. Much like i did during the whole y2k fiasco.
Mhhh... Employment by scaring the shit out of other people..... tasty
--------========+++Dont Feed The Lab Techs+++========--------
While it could certainly cause serious damage to businesses who depend on the Internet, it in no way evokes terror in people's hearts and minds. The purpose of terrorism is to coerce through terror of random violence. I'm sorry, but the threat of having a portion of the Internet shut down does not fill my heart with terror.
It's a slap in the face to all those who have died on September 11 and all other victims of terrorism around the world.
Not to mention the extremely disturbing precedent being set here. The word "terrorist" is becoming similar to how the word "communist" was used during the Cold War. I.e., a term you apply to anybody you don't like in order to dehumanize them. I find it sickening.
Yes, what a coincidence! One event might happen in a country of 140 million people only days after another suspicious event! Wow!
Don't jump to conclusions too quickly... The chances that somebody, somewhere on the planet is experiencing Internet-related problems on the same day as this was announced is pretty much 100%. It just so happens that you're the guy with the problems. Doesn't necessarily mean anything.
I smell the work of yet another Slashdot reader who just can't resist the urge to use any opporunity at his disposal to impune the GOP/Bush administration just for the sake of making it seem like he's politically savvy or at least mildly humorous.
I keep forgetting that Slashdot is (apparently) a liberals-only club where just about every thread has to have politics brought into in unnecessarily.
If the Internet is your livelyhood, then the threat of being shutdown or defaced (thereby damaging your company's reputation) is very real. While it is not life-threatening, a successful cyber attack could be very distruptive. If, for example, someone was able to shut down a large percentage of the Internet, what effect could that have on the US economy? It would not take long for serious repercussions on a world-wide scale due to loss of productivity.
No, they are not terrorists in threatening people's lives, but if they can prove that they can hit the economy, they accomplish the same goal: to create fear. Remember, one of the goals of 9/11 was not just to kill people but to hurt the US economy. Is this something to be worried about? What kind of wide-spread damage could a "cyber-terrorist" cause on the Internet?
BTW, I realize that this was a mis-quote, but it does bring up interesting questions.
I believe in de-evolution. God made the world perfect, man fell, and its been going downhill ever since!
How many 'attacks'(defaced websites, DOS attacks, etc) are attempted daily, regardless of what day of the year it is? 100, 1000,10000, more? Gostev is just making a guess at the success of tomorrows attacks. Cyber terrorists indeed, the day i become afraid and terrorized because of a DOS attack or a webpage getting defaced is the day I deserve to be beaten to a bloody pulp.
i see no reason why that's necessarily an either/or proposition, bladernr. after all, asking candidates 3 months before the election to opine on something is more or less begging for spin, isn't it?
ed
Hrm... but what about those instances where loss of the internet will increase productivity? For instance, I should be doing work right now...what if there's an interesting balance that happens (no internet hurts some folks, but helps others) such that the net effect is zero? And what's more important - net effect or effect for a given individual?
Now there's a philosophical mind-bender...
"There are a dozen opinions on a matter until you know the truth. Then there is only one." - CS Lewis (paraprhase)
When Communism fell and left Capitalism triumphant (apart from China, North Korea, Cuba...) it left a bogeyman vacuum, which didn't matter much as long as everyone was ranting about felacio in the Oral^H^H^H^H Oval Office. But now we're marketing a new Bad Guy (TM) that's just like the rest of us, only doesn't like Authority... convenient.
-- "Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum sonatur."
- Whatever is said in Latin sounds profound.
From the eweek article: "A coordinated online strike against Internet servers by terrorists, dubbed "elec tronic jihad," may or may not strike this week, security experts said." In related news, the earth may or may not fall into the sun this week. Another quote from the eweek article: "For example, a DDoS attack in June against Akamai Technologies Inc. slowed traff ic across the Internet for several hours. And in July, DoubleClick Inc.'s DNS (d omain name system) was attacked and unable to serve ads for a similar time frame." OMFG! The internet might slow down!1!1! nice to see slashdot stories have sunk to the level of the National Enquirer and the Weekly World News.
Why is this a story? Seriously... This is pure BS. You KNOW tomorrow will come and go and nothing will happen.
Might as well report that the Apocalypse is supposed to happen sometime between 7 PM and 12 AM on Friday.
Personally, I hope it does happen. There hasn't really been any interesting attacks since Code Red. I'm always looking forward to what attackers will come up with next.
If they could actually cause a "meltdown", then that would be purely amazing.
We have secretly replaced these Slashdot mods' sense of humor with a rusty nail. Let's see if they notice!!
I'm curious to see how much success they'll have. The internet was, after all, designed explicitly for the purpose of continued operation through attacks on the network.
50% of people are NOT dumber than the average person. Think distributions with heavy tails, such as the wealth distribution--a few people are really, really rich, bumping the average up, but having no effect on the dense middle part of the distribution. 50% of people are dumber than the median person, and such a person does not exist if the set has an even (non-odd) population.
Come now... chili cheese fritos taste great regardless of whether or not you're stoned.
The term "terrorist" has been applied just as much as former terms to try and convey a sense of evil and hate from the speaker to the recipient. The words "communist" and "nazi" are older examples, and are pretty much interchangeable unless the listener is actually what I call "informed".
89 people died today. Was it really necessary to make a joke at their expense (and, rather sickeningly, to mod it up to +5 as well)?
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
...I should be doing work right now...what if there's an interesting balance that happens (no internet hurts some folks, but helps others) such that the net effect is zero?
/. stories but actually do something. However, remember there is a heavy service-for-money traffic through the internet allowing many businesses to exist. W/o internet you might get some work done, but your company won't be able to pay you for it.
Well, you think you might get more productive w/o internet, because you won't read/post
The purpose of life is to find the purpose of life.
feeling a bit redundant, eh?
ALERT! fiannaFailMan has broken the code!
Quick send out the black helicopters and Men in Black to quash him!!!
Fucking conspiricist loon...
BTW the left and the right are equally offensive to me. Especially on Slashdot. I think I speak for a rather large silent majority when I say: I DON'T GIVE A FUCK WHETHER YOU LIKE BUSH OR KERRY AND WHY I SHOULD VOTE FOR ONE OVER THE OTHER! I DON'T CARE ABOUT YOUR AGENDA, WHO'S BEING PERSECUTED BY THE MODERATORS, OR ANY OTHER STUPID LAME-ASS CONSPIRACY!
Clever. A shame it doesn't mirror the images as well.
Beauty is in the eye of the beerholder.
You have just downloaded a *LOT* of pr0n.
Skal! AMS
Don't make me come over there and explain (again) the difference between "average" and "median".
David Gould
main(i){putchar(340056100>>(i-1)*5&31|!!(i<6)<< 6)&&main(++i);}
Let's speculate on the speculation and ultimately conclude it's Microsoft's fault for absolutely no reason and with no evidence. And +5 we go!
Then say that a gmail address is handed out every hundred thousand pageloads, but only if you've pinged the site and attempted to ftp into it within the last minute and a half.
Slashdot: Where anecdotes and generalizations can be freely substituted for facts, logic, or intelligence
"or pay $10 a year to get your own domain, and add your own names to map the ip addresses"
:)
Good idea... but not quite there either. DNS Time To Lives are usually 12-72 hours, so it could be days before you could view your desired website after updating your domain. You'd have to have your own DNS server out on the internet, point to your own DNS server when you registered the domain name, then set the TTL on your DNS records to like 1 minute or something. Then have a web-based DNS administration tool for your server.
Arright, I think we have a solution!
DRM 'manages access' in the same way that a prison 'manages freedom'