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Symantec: Religious Sites "Riskier Than Porn For Viruses"
First time accepted submitter kongshem writes "According to Symantec's annual Internet Security Threat Report, religious and ideological websites have far more security threats per infected site than adult/pornographic sites. Why is that? Symantec's theory: 'We hypothesize that this is because pornographic Web site owners already make money from the Internet and, as a result, have a vested interested in keeping their sites malware-free — it's not good for repeat business,'"
But jebus will protect me so I don't need your silly anti-virus
@Random_Adam
Sometimes a sig doesn't have to be funny!!
If the problem is that porn sites are more heavily monetized, that means the religions need to catch up. They could offer all kinds of services online for a price -- even eternal salvation.
Some religions already offer this, of course. Looks like a good deal to me!
There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
First they infect the children. Then they infect the computer.
Luckily a little bit of reading usually helps with the disinfection process.
There, someone had to say it :-)
In Soviet Russia, our new overlords are belong to all your base.
So how are they categorizing pornographic websites? What are the other 9 categories that are more "dangerous"?
While their ideas may be true, by my understanding it's mainly the free porn sites that are riskiest. It used to be that they set up expensive dialers, or other ways to make money. I believe it's a way for them to make money other than by serving ads or selling subscriptions, and that actually webmasters installed that stuff on their sites. Those dialers at least tended to be called after porn sites, and actually gave (paid) access to the sites.
Dialers don't work anymore these days of course, with no-one using modems and dial-up. And maybe webmasters have cleaned up their act too.
Now those religious sites, they are usually set up by people with a passion - to spread a certain message, about a religion or otherwise, and that are often people with little or no knowledge on setting up a website and keeping it malware free. As such I would expect such sites to be a relatively soft target for malware attackers, that then use the site to distribute their wares without the webmaster knowing. A very different scenario.
That porn sites are often in it for the money, will definitely also help. At least they'll have someone around that knows how to secure a web site.
This is what you get when you preach abstinence-only sex education.
Those who do not learn from commit history are doomed to regress it.
"pornography leads to terrible crimes against women and children" [from http://conservapedia.com/Porn%5D citing my sources for the reliable truth of the matter... this is reliable isn't it?
It is interesting to note that Web sites hosting adult/pornographic content are not in the top five, but ranked tenth. The full list can be seen in figure 16. Moreover, religious and ideological sites were found to have triple the average number of threats per infected site than adult/pornographic sites. We hypothesize that this is because pornographic website owners already make money from the internet and, as a result, have a vested interest in keeping their sites malware-free – it’s not good for repeat business.
Figure 16, interestingly, does not show religious and ideological sites, I assume it is grouped with "Education/Reference". The full top 10 is
Indeed, atheism has as little support in science as theism. Agnosticism is the only scientific viewpoint.
"Who is the Journal of Quantum Physics going to believe?" --Stephen Hawking
interesting how every single one of the symptoms described applies to Atheists as much as any of the faiths Dawkins intends to deride.
Yeah - except for the ones that talk about evidence though, right?
Once I was a four stone apology. Now I am two separate gorillas.
Well, let's see
It is impelled by some deep, inner conviction that something is true, or right, or virtuous: a conviction that doesn't seem to owe anything to evidence or reason, but which, nevertheless, the believer feels as totally compelling and convincing.
Atheist is impelled by conviction fuelled by external evidence, or lack of evidence. It's incredibly compelling to note that the two largest theist franchises claim their deity possesses three qualities - omnipotence, omniscience, and benevolence - and that the state of the world is completely at odds with any entity with all three qualities existing. It's also compelling to note that the more we discover about the universe, the more things we discover that work just fine without any kind of deity.
The believer typically makes a positive virtue of faith's being strong and unshakable, despite it not being based upon evidence.
Atheists don't make a positive virtue of unshakable faith. If anything we use this as an argument ad-hominem about how childish theists are. If you proved that a particular deity existed with actual evidence, most of us would probably a) pee ourselves b) recant our position.
There is a conviction that "mystery", per se, is a good thing; the belief that it is not a virtue to solve mysteries but to enjoy them and revel in their insolubility.
Many of the the most prominent atheists in the media are scientists, a kind of person who by definition delves into mysteries to see how they actually work. I personally find that atheism arises most in those with a questioning mind, the kind of mind that finds that understanding, for example, how the transition of electrons through particular quantum states governs the colour of the light emitted, does not diminish the beauty of phenomena like their aurora borealis, but instead enhances it.
There may be intolerant behaviour towards perceived rival faiths, in extreme cases even the killing of opponents or advocating of their deaths. Believers may be similarly violent in disposition towards apostates or heretics, even if those espouse only a slightly different version of the faith.
We're intolerant of unpleasant behaviour in general (giving the lie to the theistic argument that an atheist can have no moral foundation). We are particularly angered when such behaviour is justified on the basis of faith. Objectively, being a religious asshat is not worse than being a standard asshat, but we observe that religion has a tendency to nurture and encourage asshattery of certain types, and even for asshats it did not create, it provides a readily accessible stock of cherry-picked excuses and justifications for asshattery, whereas a faithless man might have fallen back on his conscience, or fear of the law.
The particular convictions that the believer holds, while having nothing to do with evidence, are likely to resemble those of the believer's parents.
I don't think this can be disputed - atheist parents are more likely to have atheist kids. This is nothing to do with religion per-se, this is an observation about culture in general.
If the believer is one of the rare exceptions who follows a different religion from his parents, the explanation may be cultural transmission from a charismatic individual.
Another observation about culture and how it's transmitted, but it fits in with the "viral ideas" theory. Ideas ARE viral, and we invent new transmission vectors like Twitter, and hashtags.
The internal sensations of the 'faith-sufferer' may be reminiscent of those more ordinarily associated with sexual love.
I don't think atheists have a woody for the absence of a deity. I don't think you can be sexually excited about the absence of something. I think atheists, just like everyone else, can have displacement of their sexual urges in a fetishi
You're kidding right? Monetisation is the backbone of all major and proselytising religions.
I think we should give porn (and other commercial sex services like prostitution) the tax free status possessed by all religions, no matter how stupid, dangerous, or just obviously fraudulent. If scientology, sleazebag televangelists and the pope can all soak the gullible for millions and not pay a cent in taxes, why shouldn't porn stars and prostitutes? At least they're honest when they lie to you.
Science is all about firing a drunk pig out of a cannon just to see what happens.
I don't agree. Agnosticism is just weak atheism, and only relevant if you ascribe special importance to some religions and their gods. Otherwise, what's the point of being agnostic about EVERYTHING you can't know whether it exists or not? It's nonsense. "Oh, I'm an agnostic about the invisible pink unicorn (blessed be her holy hooves), and about Kropal the mighty God of Making Holes in Socks, and about Thor and about Klaatu and about Mohammed and about Jesus and about Cats being the avatars of our master race and about ...".
Anyone who can seriously invent a god and then say that the only scientific viewpoint is to be agnostic about it (because you know, who knows, right?), is just hiding behind their mother's skirts.
Belief is the currency of delusion.
How so? Let's look at them one-by-one.
1. Deep conviction of truth without evidence. Atheists in general have so such conviction. Atheism is the absence of belief, not an alternative belief. 0 points.
2. Unshakable faith. Most atheists and certainly most atheist scholars argue against dogmatism and in favor of evidence-based belief and decision making. 0 points.
3. Mystery as such is inherently good. I'm going to skip this one; ascribing it to atheists seems "not even wrong." 0 points.
4. Intolerant behavior toward rival faiths. Atheists may be intolerant of religious people, true, but profession of atheism has been a killing offence in many places for thousands of years. Atheists also do not claim that people who disagree with them deserve and will suffer an eternity of pain. Let's say, half a point.
5. Particular convictions are likely to resemble those of one's parents. Probably true of people in general, however atheists are also much more likely to have different beliefs than do their parents. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and a full point.
6. If beliefs differ from the parents, a singular charismatic individual may be responsible. I think it's much more common for people to become atheists due to internal reflection and external observations, than it is for them to become religious. However, Dawkins, Hitchens, etc. fall into the category of "charismatic individuals". 1 point.
7. Internal feelings may be similar to romantic love. I don't think anyone is really experiencing the passion of the nothing that way, and their are no wives of the nothing (i.e. atheist nuns) either. 0 points.
So of the 7 "symptoms" Dawkins describes, just 2.5 of them can be fairly ascribed to atheists.
.: Semper Absurda
Rejcting a claim that has zero evidence and defies logic is not only scientific, it's common-sense. Dawkin's has on many occasions stated in plain english that neither he nor anyone else can be absolutely sure that unicorns don't fart rainbows, but that there is absolutely zero evidence to suggest that unverifyable reports of such beasts are anything more than an elaborate fiction. If you had spent more than 5 minutes to read his books, listen to his lectures, or watch his debates, you would have known that.
If you are interested in forming a more accurate picture of Dawkins rather than parroting the Fox and Friends charactature that is so popular in the US, the first of his books with a religious theme that I would recommend is "Unweaving the Rainbow".
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
It is not even that. Atheism and Agnosticism exist on orthogonal axes. Theism and Atheism make ontological statements about the existence resp. nonexistence of deities. Agnosticism, on the other hand, makes an epistemological statement about the possibility to know about said existence. It is perfectly possible to be an agnostic theist as well as an agnostic atheist.
As for the scientific validity - in absence of evidence, the default assumption is non-existence. It is simple as that. Do we need that debate every single fucking time the weekly religion vs. atheism thread pops up?
Ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.
Would science ever come up with religion as a reasonable hypothesis if it weren't for oral transmission of myths? No, because it's patently absurd.
If you think someone isn't free to have a different definition of "freedom" you may be a tyrant.
I have met many clever people who are members of churches, but their time given to their churches is voluntary.
Often the equipment has been donated as well, and so is usually not particularly modern either.
The website design is usually managed by a committee, as is the choice of hosting provider, and costs are kept to a minimum.
The net result is that once the web site is finally done, it may be neglected, or someone inherits the responsibility for it who knows little about its history, and might be more secretarial than technical. Thus security updates get neglected, and quite often there are many user accounts with weak passwords.
The Symantec report, the Internet Security Threat Report, 2011 Trends, did not say what the article in the OP claims.
The actual report is here: http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/other_resources/b-istr_main_report_2011_21239364.en-us.pdf . Page 33 of the report, the only discussion of religion, states
"religious and ideological sites were found to have triple the average number of threats per infected site than
adult/pornographic sites."
Three points:
1. The report lumps religious and ideological sites together. Maybe the infected sites were ideological (non-religious) sites. You cannot conclude anything about religious sites at all from that statistic.
2. The report implies nothing about the safety of religious/ideological sites. It just says that if a religious/ideological site is infected, then it has more threats on average than an infected adult site. If the percentage of religious/ideological sites that are infected is lower than the percentage of adult sites that are infected, then religious/ideological sites could be much safer on average. Indeed, figure 16 on page 36 of the report doesn't list religous/ideological sites as dangerous. The point is that the safety of religious/ideological sites as a whole must account for uninfected sites. The "number of threats per infected site" is just about irrelevant.
3. If there is any limit to the gullibility or statistical illiteracy of internet users, I have yet to perceive it.
I would like to see it please.
I fix PC's for an ISP in the bible belt of the USA, and I have to fix about 20 computers a day with viruses, and they've been to no porn sites, downloaded no torrents or mp3's or illegal software. But they ALL have Daily Bible Guide or some sort of religious shit that they threaten me not to remove.
Defender of Microsoft and Communism!!!
Dawkin's has on many occasions stated in plain english that neither he nor anyone else can be absolutely sure that unicorns don't fart rainbows, but that there is absolutely zero evidence to suggest that unverifyable reports of such beasts are anything more than an elaborate fiction.
An often used argument but not a valid one. There are many reason why this or Russel's Teapot is not a valid analogy to the belief in god.
1. Unverifiable reports? You rarely hear people reporting unicorns but I never heard anyone reporting a unicorn farting rainbows or a teapots in space. There are however a huge amount of people claiming some religious experience. Sure, this can possibly be all be bogus but this sure is a reason to investigate religious claims much more seriously then claims of farting unicorns.
2. There is no good reason why a farting unicorn would not have been noticed and caught by now. Religions usually provide built-in reasons why their god wasn't noticed by anyone yet.
3. Also try to replace farting unicorns by intelligent alien life in a different sun system. There is no evidence for this either, but still doesn't seem unlikely. Why? Because we can interpolate using our scientific knowledge about the development of life on earth and about the universe. We can get the result that the existence intelligent life outside of earth is possible and can even be considered likely. So for claims without evidence, Humans don't usually rule them out by default, but instead try to estimate an answer to the question by using knowledge about similar entities. For farting unicorns or teapots in space we got a lot of knowledge about horses and other animals, about regular teapots and space which we can use to estimate that these claims are very unlikely.
But what kind of knowledge about similar entities do we have to estimate anything about the existence of god? We got no good knowledge about any existing entity that shares just some basic properties with god.
Also check out the famous debate of Russell vs. Copleston. And while I don't think Copleston's cosmological argument proves the existence of god, it shows at least one thing: For anything to exist, there must be something that bends the usual rule of contingency. So such a deistic god is not a arbitrary assumption, but instead an possible answer for the fundamental question ("Why is there anything and not nothing?") with only a small number of possible answers.
Jan
... Er, ah ... no. As I already said - and I will now paraphrase using your terms so you can feel comfortable - in the real world almost all Christian religions pass a basket. In the real world almost no Buddhist sects pass one.
Hi! Practicing Buddhist here. There is a box by the door of our Zendo (meditation room) that says "Dana" on it (Sanskrit for "Generosity"). We are regularly and gently encouraged to toss a few bucks in. Our practice group rents the space we sit in; and rent, heating, cushions, incense, etc. all cost money. The teachers do not take any salary and all have day jobs, but we all chip in what we can to support our practice.