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Two-Thirds of Lost USB Drives Carry Malware

Posted by samzenpus on from the bugs-everywhere dept.

itwbennett writes "Antivirus firm Sophos acquired a passel of USB sticks lost by commuters on trains in the Greater Sydney metro area at an auction organized by the Rail Corporation New South Wales. The company analyzed 50 USB sticks and found that not a single one was encrypted and 33 of them were infected with at least one type of malware."

6 of 196 comments (clear)

  1. What do you expect .. by roguegramma · · Score: 5, Funny

    .. they were lost by the 10% of commuters stupid enough to lose an USB stick.

    --
    Hey don't blame me, IANAB
  2. I can't believe that many people... by Fallingcow · · Score: 4, Funny

    ... carry acroread.exe and/or iexplore.exe around on their USB sticks.

    Weird.

  3. Safe USB by FuzzyHead · · Score: 5, Funny

    I practice safe USB plugging. I put a rubber cover over my USB stick before I try to plug it in to anything. I have never once caught a virus on it.

  4. Re:Mac by John+Bresnahan · · Score: 4, Funny

    FTA

    One interesting aspect of the results was that based on their data and formatting seven of the infected storage devices belonged to Mac OS X users or had been extensively used under this OS.

    Which means that those USB drives had been plugged in to a Windows machine at least once.

  5. Re:Truecrypt? by Anachragnome · · Score: 4, Funny

    Thanks.

    I guess the old adage still applies...

    "Careful where you stick that thing, son..."

  6. Re:Truecrypt? by Artifakt · · Score: 4, Funny

    how would they know if some sort of stenography was being implemented

    You are correct. There is no known way to detect which files were transcribed in shorthand by a person taking dictation before being entered by keyboard...
    Oh, wait, you meant "steganography", didn't you?

    --
    Who is John Cabal?