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Kama Sutra Worm Hits Softly
An anonymous reader writes "Despite warnings of the danger posed by the Kama Sutra worm, ZDNet is reporting that things haven't been nearly as bad as expected." From the article: "There have been 'no reports of any (Kama Sutra) detonations so far. Also, the virus seems to be dropping in e-mail prevalence. It was down to second place yesterday, according to our monitoring stations, and slid again into third place today,' Paul Ducklin, head of technology at Sophos Asia-Pacific, told ZDNet Australia. The worm's ranking was overtaken by MyDoom and Netsky variants, which have been around for a number of years. "
It sounds like the news over hyped a story for no reason. Say it ain't so!
I got:
Nothing for you to see here. Please move along.
the first few times I tried to view this article. Are we sure Slashdot isn't infected?
________________________________________________
suwain_2
I, for one, would favor a slightly smarter Internet that simply filtered out known threats, stopping any further spread once they're identified. The fact that attacks continue to run years after they're first known is just plain stupid!
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
It was all pretty much media hype from the beginning.
that might just be the raciest title on a /. article ever. W0W
when there is a particular date they can get in a tizzy about. No one will know they were making a mountain out of a mole hill until the "crisis" has passed. Remeber the michelangelo virus?
"Prefiero morir de pie que vivir siempre arrodillado!"
Sorry, it IS so. The media uses end-of-the-world headlines because it gets people riled up and excited, and this news about the Kama Sutra worm falls into that category...
My sig is permanently on strike.
Does this mean A) we've done a good job training our users or B) no one infected with this worm is willing to admit it?
Most of the users I support would rather reconstruct their documents than admit they clicked on a "free pr0n" e-mail. Wonder how accurate this news really is.
There is no reasonable defense against an idiot with an agenda
:wq
I felt all flushed with fever, embarrassed by the crowd, ...
I felt he found my letters and read each one out loud.
I prayed that he would finish but he just kept right on
Strumming my pain with his fingers,
Singing my life with his words,
Killing me softly with his song,
Killing me softly with his song,
Telling my whole life with his words,
Killing me softly with his song...
That's what came to mind when i read the title "Kama Sutra Worm Hits Softly." It's not my fault though, my mother subjected me to years of 'light' music on my way to school.
Anyways, I'm not surprised the media took this one and ran with it. When was the last time they had a 'major' malicious virus to talk about?
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
Of course it's soft at first. But wait until it changes positions a few times! It will be surprisingly intense before long.
/syle
The news corporations rolled the dice and were secretly hoping that Kama Sutra would cause some serious damage. Why? Because now the news outlets would have a whole new set of stories for you. The news services would have created their own top story. You'd see computer security exposes on news broadcasts for at least a week.
And while you're watching the news, make sure you look closely at these words from our sponsors.
Yeah, and the assocation Kama Sutra == faboulus sex in various positions fit for those training gymnastics since age five.
Possibly, the reason it didn't hit so hard was the fact that it was so hyped.
If someone warns me that I'm about to get hit by a car, and I move and avoid being hit, I wouldn't say that there was nothing to be worried about.
It's a virus.
Surely Slashdot knows the difference? A virus/trojan relies on user stupidity. A worm relies on software insecurity.
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
And think how many more people, having done that, are at least in some way a little more protected from becoming a spam zombie.
500GB of disk, 5TB of transfer, $5.95/mo
My mail system filters tens of thousands of messages per day, for various businesses and it hasn't logged a single one of those viruses. So, as far as I'm concerned, the whole thing is much ado about nothing...
Oh well, what the hell...
The worm's ranking was overtaken by MyDoom and Netsky variants, which have been around for a number of years.
This information distorts the issue. Kama Sutra carries an extremely destructive payload, deleting a user's local data and data on attached network drives (and, worse, the antivirus software on the networked computers can't prevent these deletions). This cannot be directly compared to MyDoom or NetSky, which merely clog networks, install backdoors (that are not usually used for anything nearly as destructive), and turn computers into spam and DoS zombies.
The above statement is like saying that rainstorms have overtaken tornados in prevalence. That doesn't matter, because tornados do much, much more damage than rainstorms do.
In all fairness though, you may not notice a critical document has been lost until a few days down the line...
A new MS company that fixes bugs that the viruses are taking advantage of.
How many here, have had a win-sysadmin, send out messages "please don't open mails with the subjest 'OpenMePlease', it will possibly cause bad things."
Sounds like a serious bug with the mail program. The mail program should not by default run attached programs or open attatche documents that trigger macros.
I really think that people are becoming more and more prepared for viruses, I would also venture to say that more and more people are running virus scanners and more and more isps are filtering the content of the emails and other methods of transmissions.
Overreaction? Maybe, but definitly better than underreaction.
it said 15 million infections :-(
7 65247
http://webstats.web.rcn.net/cgi-bin/Count.cgi?df=
Looks like someone could use a little blue pill before using the Kama Sutra.
It sounds like the news over hyped a story for no reason. Say it ain't so!
The submitter was just trying to score some Karma Sutra points...
Instead of it saying "Schoolgirl fantasies gone wrong" it said "Schoolgirl does math homework and studies history".
over the next several days.
...because many people are moving to Linux. Obviously if
Microsoft's market share really is as big as they claim
then the virus would have hit much harder.
Hey, at least they made me do my backup on schedule. This does not happen often, you know.
Well it's pretty obvious. Most places that allow Joe Public to post or report news require registration. The Kama Sutra deletes DOC files, where Joe Public keeps all of his passwords. Now they can't access e-mail, post stories, or read the NY Times to even find out about the virus. ;)
But really, when the average user experiences problems on a PC, they're so bewildered by PCs as it is that they figure it's their fault and call upon the neighbourhood geek to fix their woes. Why would they ever hold software vendors responsible for any problems they experience in Windows? Downloaded software from Fred's Shed has enough spyware and malware as pack-ins, they figure it must be that. Or they just didn't know what they were doing.
Are people not getting fed up of experiencing problems? Do they just decide to part ways with PCs or that they'll buy a new one or reinstall everything? Wtf?
Twinstiq, game news
Acutally, if the story were to be repeated numerous times over the next few days, it would be nothing out of the ordinary.
In Soviet Russia, asses suck this joke.
Karma Sutra worm hits ./!
I'm thinking zero. I've seen a number of systems on which Norton was able to identify that an infection took place, but was powerless to do anything about it. In fact, I've never seen Norton actually remove an infection of any kind. Anecdotal evidence, true, but IMO Symantec products are worth less than the media they're printed on.
"Kama Sutra == faboulus sex in various positions fit for those training gymnastics since age five."
* At least 18 - 5 = 13 years of training required by U.S. law.
Yeah but just wait til the Tantra worm hits... wait for it... wait for it....
EvilCON - Made Famous by
Despite warnings, or BECAUSE of them? The Houston Chronicle thinks the latter, and I'm inclined to agree.
I don't work today (well, not at my job at least... the joys of college life) and I was happily taunting all the other employees that covered the student open computer labs of the joy they were bound to have today while I leisurely took the day off for more importan things, like posting on /.
Now, it looks like I'll have to hang my head in shame on Monday. Curse you media, curse you!
Hwy.. nothing wrong with over-hyping something like this. Your right in your analogy. Anyone remember the panic of y2k ? A lot of work because of some liitle numbers that were hyped. I bellives that for the most part that the lights would go out for a while. Maybe a couple of stock markets migbht not open for a few days. Who knows... But no fallign planes or anything so fun.. but thanx for the warnings.. I can feel safe knowing my remote is y2k compliant... ;)
I have mod points and I am not afraid to use them.
Are you the brother I never knew about?
Prove it.
And how ISPs are experimenting with notifying infected subscribers and blocking their traffic! Nothing like an opportunity to test a controversial measure in times of FUD.
Sexbomb, sexbomb!
I'm your main target, come and help me ignite.
Make me explode although you know the route to go to sex me slow.
No don't get me wrong ain't gonna do you no harm no,
This bomb's made for lovin' and you can't shoot it far
Sexbomb sexbomb you're a sexbomb
You can give it to me when I need to come along
Sexbomb sexbomb you're my sexbomb
And baby you can turn me on turn me on darlin'
Sexbomb sexbomb you're my sexbomb sexbomb
You can give it to me when I need to come along
Sexbomb sexbomb your're my sexbomb
And baby you can turn me on
Yup, that's the whole thing. Sure glad that the folks at Ziff Davis linked to it!
Three Squirrels
C) The Anti-Virus vendors made a much bigger deal out of this than it really was to increase sales.
Now what am I going to do with 500,000 T-shirts, stickers, coffee mugs, mouse pads, and other miscellaneous paraphernalia printed with the slogan "I got pwned by Kama Sutra!"
Prove it.
I can hear the marketing department of a dozen antivirus companies go
"Oh Crap"
Where have all the virus makers gone anyway. We must either start funding script kiddies, or get into the antispam business.
"Give orange me give eat orange me eat orange give me eat orange give me you." -Nim Chimpsky
Funny, but a nit-pick, if I may...
* At least 18 - 5 = 13 years of training required by U.S. law.
take a look a this: http://www.avert.org/aofconsent.htm
the age of consent in the US differs from state to state, 18 in (quick count) only 13 states (most 16, 17)
and the US State with the lowest AoC goes to... (drumroll)
South Carolina @ 14!
They should adopt "Lowest age of consent law in the union!" as their new state motto and put it on license plates.
There is much cruelty in the universe, John.
Yeah, we seem to have the tour map.
And think how many of those people now believe the little more protection they just purchased is absolute protection and that they're free to open any and all attachments they get from now on.
Ok, I screwed up (no pun intended)
;-)
The great states of Iowa an Misouri also have 14, and where there are two different numbers for the same state it means
the law within that country or state varies according to region or circumstances.
So, I'm guessing 14 is legal if you are married (preferrably to a close relative),
There is much cruelty in the universe, John.
Yeah, we seem to have the tour map.
It's called foreplay!!!
:-D
I jest!!
In South Carolina, and this isn't actually a joke, the age of consent is fourteen...with your parents permission.
It's 18 otherwise. Made for many many "Do you have a note from your parents?" jokes when I was in high school.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
And just look at it this way, if a person was only prompted to install an AV system when the news hyped up this worm then do you think that same person will be very likely to keep the system updated and run regular checks? Doubtful.
Semper Fi
i am in shock and awe that people thought this was going to hit hard. the vast multitude of steps that had to be done manually by a user to infect your machine was silly. this has nothing to do with windows security, there is no patch for stupid. if people freely run scripts that are attached to porn emails that randomly turn up in your in box, than the world of pc's, regardless of OS, is not for you. i have two windows boxes at home, both with NO anti-virus at all, i didn't even bother checking them for this virus while watching panicked "computer security specialists" on tv talking out their ass. BTW, i have had home PC's since the apple II and i only install anti-virus once a year for a sweep and i have only had one virus or security related problem on a home pc ever...and that's with MS Windows. i can't believe what passes as experts these days.
Wow, some state legislature actually drafted and voted in a law that makes it legal for your 14-year-old to have sex, as long as they have a note from home!
Like I said in another comment, sounds like an exception for marriages involving close relations. I know I've heard that in some states you have to be 18 to get married, unless you have permission from your parents and then it's 16. 14 - wow, that seems seriously messed up to me.
There is much cruelty in the universe, John.
Yeah, we seem to have the tour map.
Before you get too excited about low ages of consent -- you can STILL be charged with "corruption of a minor," "exposure to a minor" and similar crimes for having relations with someone under 18. If the parents, cops, DA or whoever wants to get you, they CAN get you and put you on a sex offender list for the rest of your life.
Recursive: Adj. See Recursive.
It's obviously controlling its execution and waiting as long as possible before delivering its payload :-)
"Foolproof design", and "solid usability" don't go hand in hand. The more you try to prevent users from being able to do things that might infect themselves, the more you prevent them from being able to DO THINGS!
You can make something more fool-proof. But they'll just come out with bigger fools.
"It sounds like the news over hyped a story for no reason. Say it ain't so!"
So... was the story overhyped, or did the hyping of the story cause ppl to protect themselves? If it's the latter, kudos.
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
I've read a lot of comments saying "Over hyped" but maybe in this case that's a GOOD thing. My dad didn't know ANYTHING about it at all until he called me out into the family room asking "Did you hear that?" "What?" "The Kama Sutra worm." "Oh. Yeah. Don't worry. We're fine."
So maybe all of the news exposure was a good thing.
South Carolina @ 14!
... except a lot of people might object to the term "union" in SC :)
They should adopt "Lowest age of consent law in the union!" as their new state motto and put it on license plates.
I can't be the only one who snickered when I saw the subject of this post. Anybody else?
-s
I know my friend's parents bought and installed a copy of mcaffee anti-virus, despite her urgings to use AVGFree instead. I'm sure the AV companies are making bank off the headlines.
Even people that believe in pre-destiny look both ways before crossing the street.
Just another day of working with MicroSoft.
Move along, move along.
I thought this article was about a new sex toy
Also see here (if you speak Italian)
Seems like having to have 10,000 computers shut down for a day is a big deal... We won't hear about the real impact until next week, I'm guessing.
"terrorism" and "pedophilia" are the root passwords to the Constitution
What a stupid idea. That's like saying that if people buy condoms, they'll just have lots of unprotected sex and get HIV because they think they'll be protected, so it's best not to buy condoms.
Any decent virus scanner worth its salt should pick up email viruses anyway.
By summer it was all gone...now shesmovedon. --
The Scorpion Worm, however, will rock you like a hurricane.
... so you can't really go wrong in calling it a worm or a virus. However, I think the term virus should supersede worm, but maybe that's just me.
Yeah, they had a field day with this one. Some brilliant wag said "hey, end of the world headline *and* a sexual conotation on the name!" Pure gold...
People ate it up though. I received no less then three articles from my boss on this "impending doom".
But the fact that it depended on user stupidity and not a hole or exploit had me calm over this. Not to say that some of our users aren't a bit clueless, it's just that they value their jobs enough to avoid emails that offer them "free nekkid pics".
Creationist Textbook Stickers Declared Unconstitutional by CowboyNeal
> Before you get too excited about low ages of consent
excited? no
revolted? sorta
suprised? not really
up in arms? hardly
There is much cruelty in the universe, John.
Yeah, we seem to have the tour map.
Condoms in a kama sutra story, nice but not quite right. Condoms have been shown to be effective. Antivirus programs have yet to protect anyone from the yearly M$ spread disease. OpenBSD might be considered a good condom, GNU/Linux distributions are condoms too but some are like the kind you get at a truck stop or the feel good extra thin kind. A distro with Macromedia Flash might be considered, "ribbed for her pleasure." Hooking up Windoze to a network is kind of like going blind drunk at a gay bar on the wrong side of the tracks.
As it was in the beginning, is as it is and ever shall be.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
And think how many more people, having done that, are at least in some way a little more protected from becoming a spam zombie.
No, don't tell me, I know this one... erm... hmm... both of them?
Terrible analogy which holds absolutely no weight. I'm not even going to explain why because it's so blatantly obvious.
Thank you so much for contributing to the improvement of the signal to noise ratio in this discussion.
Get a warning like that everyday and you'll start ignoring all warnings, including the real ones.
Given your interest is in reducing S/N ratio here, I know your thanks are as sincere as the rest of your posts.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Not sure exactly what your opinon is but there's so many people who think it was a non-issue and in that case: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Y2k#Reported_errors
h ecy) be it viruses or anything else bad :)
It's a puny list which doesn't surprise me as most of the failure cases I know of are covered by confidentiality agreements.
Three cheers for self-defeating prohecies (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-defeating_prop
this comment is provided "as is" and without any express or implied legibility or congruity [...]
I have a botnet with 20,000+ nodes, I scanned my machines for this last week. I dont want to share my bitches with anyone else.
Healthy paranoia or y2k-like panic? Personally, from all the attention these warnings have generated, I was expecting mayham; instead, we get "no reports of Kama Sutra explosions."
Maybe this was the reaction intended by the author of the worm - to prepare the real next BIG attack when no one pays attention to warnings anymore.
Views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of the author.
So a 18.05 year-old male has sex with a 17.98 year-old female and the male is branded as a rapist for life if convicted?
It's like deja vu all over again. The same thing happened about 15 years ago (way before ) when the Michelangelo virus was supposed to strike, the media covered it as the end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it, and... poof... nothing happened.
heh...heh...heh...just wait until July 4th, 2055.
Please spoo into this test tube, sir, while ma'me lies back waiting for the turkey baster. Pay no attention to the highly educated and trained staff, supported by millions of dollars worth of complicated medical equipment who will perform magic behind the curtain.
This "email worm" is more like a virus than a worm. It doesn't exploit an automatic execution hole in a popular email package, and thus it requires a user to execute the malware for it upon receipt of the email. This is social engineering, and purists can argue that it's a virus, not a worm. It doesn't self replicate, unless expensive medical intervention (in vitro fertilization) is also self-replication. (Note that this effort with respect to the malware requires only a modestly educated and trained person with a five hundred dollar PC to help execute the virus to steal or otherwise wreck havock on valuable data, rather than a highly skilled staff with millions of dollars worth of equipment.)
Well, in some circumstances it might self replicate. Symantec's description indicates that it attempts automatic propagation (including execution) using Windows C$ and Admin shares. This probably works in some LAN environments.
Like so many other bits of malware, it sports a mixture of virus-like and worm-like features (although not many worm-like features in this instance). Many other bits of malware last year routinely arrived in an email and then, once actived by a single user behind the company firewall, began probing the network to exploit one or more wormable holes.
If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine.
In this Videochat are all over 18 years old!Live Videochat
Have a nice day!
When it comes to virus warnings, predictions, and precautions. There's a stark choice. Cry wolf and have nothing happen, or stick head in sand and get kicked in the butt?
Only 'safe' files should be opened.
...
A text file is safe, so that can be opened if clicked, right.
An html file is safe, assuming the browser is safe.
A word document is safe, unless it has macros.
Probably, when launching word by association, a special flag should be passed. 'word -nomacros'.
An excel document is safe, unless it has macros.
Probably, when launching word by association, a special flag should be passed. 'excel -nomacros'.
An EXE/BAT file is not safe....