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New Trojan Threatens Windows XP SP 2
lightdarkness writes "Symantec is reporting about a new virus called Phel (Anagram of 'help') which is a Trojan which spreads via a HTML file. All the user needs to do is go to the page, and it takes advantage of the vulnerability in the IE Help control component files. This allows the attacker to download malicious programs on to the machine. Worst part is, this is one of the exploits that even effects SP2. Microsoft is said to be working to stop the spread, and to release a patch." The exploit is apparently not the same as the help file problems disclosed last week.
IE - Internet Exploiter
Who says trojans are bad?
You can pull one over your case and stop the spread of windows and aol. Shipping a trojan condom with AOL cds could also help stop the reproduction of aol users. Way to go Trojan! You set a good example for the rest of us. Windows XP std2 is a threat to us all, and with your help, we may just annihilate it yet! Of course, then you are still at risk for penguin gout, and gnu herpes.... but that's a post for a different story(most likely the double posting of this).
Quite frankly, I can't understand why people get "impressed", I mean, let's look at history for a while... it isn't something new -- for the past probably, let's say 7 years Microsoft has been making the same mistakes over and over. It's nothing new that every vulnerability that is found affect their "benevolents" Service Packs, happened with Service Pack 1 and now 2 in Windows XP, happened with all the Service Packs on NT, and then Windows 2000... seriously. All I have to say is, Microsoft is like a teenage girl -- you never know what you're gonna get --JR.
WARNING: DO NOT LET DR. MARIO TOUCH YOUR GENITALS. HE IS NOT A REAL DOCTOR!
I believe in Windows XP theres a Help and Support service that you can disable, although that may be Compaq-specific. I've never tried killing it.
Microsoft is working to forensically analyze the malicious code in Phel and will work with law enforcement agencies to identify and bring to justice those responsible for the malicious activity, he said.
They always want to catch the bad guys but Microsoft itself is never held responsible fot the damages their crippled software causes.
As a software developer myself, I know it's almost impossible to make a big software product 100% bug free but come on... Microsoft's software is becoming ridiculous!
There would be a fix by now if it where an OSS , Gnu/Linux project.
I am a REAL American from Canada , not a wanna-be from the country , self called "last remaining superpower" "of America
Microsoft will lose before it manages to put out a new and more secure version of IE (assuming that is even possible ;-)).
Or a lite version. They're fighting an uphill battle -- they need to keep their code compatible with the buttload of non standard features they've introduced over the years (mainly things like activex windows-specific plugins) that people have build applications on top of. If they were to release something that was stripped down (yet retained all the functionality of something on the level with Firefox) and gave the user a choice to install the backwards-compatible mess, they might get out of this situation.
Of course they won't because that gives people a migration path off IE (and eventually off Windows).
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2B1ASK1
For those interested, check out this source code. Virus and Trojan problems seem to just gravitate toward Microsoft products. So, Microsoft is the problem.
Click here or here.
The purpose of using IE is that it enables Windows to have a single HTML renderer loaded up into memory for a wide variety of tasks. By switching over to HTML based help, Microsoft has consolidated various rendering engines into one (HTML, specifically IE), all while reducing the overall memory footprint used up by the system.
Now this is all good and fine, and should work perfectly, just so long as the system properly maintains what security level a given file is in.
This is a key issue, apparently MS keeps screwing this up...
Aside from that (doh!), IE integrated into the system is very convenient.
VERY convenient! With a sufficiently fast Internet connection, the difference between the Internet and one's own computer is quickly blurred.
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