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Fujitsu To Develop Vigilante Computer Virus For Japan
wiedzmin writes "Japanese Defense Ministry has awarded Fujitsu a contract to develop a vigilante computer virus, which will track down and eliminate other viruses, or rather — their sources of origin. Are 'good' viruses a bad idea? Sophos seems to think so, saying, 'When you're trying to gather digital forensic evidence as to what has broken into your network, and what data it may have stolen, it's probably not wise to let loose a program that starts to trample over your hard drives, making changes.'"
Are 'good' viruses a bad idea?
McAfee, Norton, AVG, etc have built businesses around good viruses.
What do I know, I'm just an idiot, right?
What happens when the Fujitsu virus meets itself and destroys its own source of origin?
Malicious authors would love that - another angle for them to take advantage of. Anyone with clue isn't going to trust a polite virus unless they've been told to expect it, and by the time they've been told this polite virus is friendly, the malicious authors will already be using polite messages to get users clicking where they want them to.
I propose then we name the new "good virus" "Agent Smith"
Agent Smith: I'd like to share a revelation that I've had during my time here. It came to me when I tried to classify your operating system and I realized that its not actually an operating system at all. Every OS on the Internet develops a natural equilibrium with the surrounding hardware environment, but your Windows does not. Its installed on fresh hardware and grows and grows until every hardware resource is consumed and the only way you can survive is to wipe the machine and start over. There is another program on the Internet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is? A virus. Windows is a disease, a cancer of the Internet. You're a plague and we are the cure.