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Australian ISPs To Disconnect Botnet "Zombies"
jibjibjib writes "Some of Australia's largest ISPs are preparing an industry code of conduct to identify and respond to users with botnet-infected computers. The Internet Industry Association, made up of over 200 ISPs and technology companies, is preparing the code in response to an ultimatum from the federal government.
ISPs will try to contact the user, slow down their connection, and ultimately terminate the connection if the user refuses to fix the problem. It is hoped that this will reduce the growth of botnets in Australia, which had the world's third-highest rate of new 'zombies' (behind the US and China)."
Oddly enough that's close enough to a decent solution to work.
How about we START with that, and work our way back to allowing pre-vetted workstations back onto the interwebs. I like the idea of running a simple system checking script though a web browser based internet portal the same way you must login to a hotspot to gain access to the internet.
Make that kind of access a precondition for users who were deemed to be hosting malware/bots and go from there. Once confirmed as clean the portal requirement disappears. The portal software will have to be hosted by a non-profit with government oversight for obvious reasons.
Of course I'm OK if that software isn't particularly Mac compatible ;)
This is a perfect opportunity to get that pesky free speech done away with. Just declare every kind of government-critical information a "misuse of computers", and you can institute a quarantine on any "zombie" computer being used to distribute malicious "anti-government spam". It's such an awesome plan that I feel the urge to cackle.
The users who are likely to be infected by a bot are the least likely to be able to "fix the problem".
True... But this is where frankly I'd like to see Microsoft, in particular, -pay up- to provide fixes for such machines. As a strawman: Microsoft provides tools and training, and then the end user pays a relatively low fixed fee to get his machine deloused before it can be put back on the net.
But, extending the car analogy earlier, a great proportion of the Internet "community" consists of poorly-maintained, poorly-driven SUVs with huge "Why, yes, I DO own the road" bumper stickers.
The Internet community disappeared on the first day of Eternal September, in 1993.
Seriously. The car analogy is strikingly apropos of the societal problem. If people are selfish, distracted, road-raging boors in self-propelled road-hazards on real roads, where you can (and SHOULD!) look out through the windshield at your probable victims... where your real identity is just one license-plate lookup away... and where there is real law enforcement with real laws to enforce just patrolling around looking out for you to misbehave... how much worse will it be, when it's just you, the Intarwebs, and a grillion MyFace "friends" that you will really never meet.. where you work under the assumption of fair anonymity and no law enforcement (perhaps a mistaken assumption, but not really obviously so for most)...
It's a miracle the Internet works at all any more.
Welcome to the Panopticon. Used to be a prison, now it's your home.