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Microsoft, FBI Takedown Citadel Botnet
hypnosec writes "Microsoft in collaboration with the FBI have successfully taken down the Citadel botnet which was known to control millions of PCs across the globe and was allegedly responsible for bank fraud in excess of $500 million. Citadel was known to have over 1,400 instances across the globe with most located in the US, Europe, India, China, Hong Kong and Singapore. It would install key-logging tools on target systems, which were then used to steal online banking credentials."
Wait what? Thats over $350k per machine. Are the numbers screwed up here or is this just part of the NSA slush fund to build data centers?
Call me when they take down the bankers who have illegally laundered trillions of dollars in the LIBOR scandal.
The FBI should use the C&C servers to force the machines to run Windows Update and clean the machines of the virus. The users obviously don't want to take care of their own machine, and if something goes wrong they'll know that they had a virus.
Quite right. People who lack the self respect to spell correctly don't deserve to be published.
On *Windows* target systems, you mean.
on the phone and lead them thru the process of cleaning up their infected machine.
That worked perfectly when they called me :-)
Good god; we better avoid anything that is only one molecule away from another!
I'm not sure of the validity of your claims on margarine, so references would have been nice. However I used to drive past a margarine factory in Sydney most evenings and the smell coming out of that place has ensured I will never consciously eat margarine.
hell that's nothing, Dihydrogen Monoxide is only one ATOM away from being a substance known to cause a condition called Black Hairy Tongue as well as abdominal pains, vomiting, and diarhea!
Ice Cream has no bones.
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/Press/2013/Jun13/06-05DCUPR.aspx
Now.. with better writing (than the original linked article)
I must object to the use of "Takedown" as a verb.The headline clearly should have been "Microsoft, FBI Take Down Citadel Botnet".
This issue is rampant in IT circles, in which "setup", "login", "checkout", and "shutdown" (all of which are acceptable nouns) are more commonly used as verbs than are the verb phrases from which they were constructed: "set up", "log in", "check out", and "shut down". The nouns are each composed of a verb and a preposition, and now in our laziness, we insist on using these compound words as if they were still verbs. Take a minute - a fraction of a second, actually - and insert the space character that makes them two separate words, and therefore makes them a valid verb phrase.
Some may reply that I am being uptight about this, but I usually don't make a big deal of the poor language skills (or simple carelessness) of others. Indeed, who has the time? However, I speak up in cases such as this because this sort of slop is indicative of sloppy thinking. And I should never find sloppy thinking amongst the brilliant professionals who patronize this establishment.
when they have all the access through the corporations.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/us-intelligence-mining-data-from-nine-us-internet-companies-in-broad-secret-program/2013/06/06/3a0c0da8-cebf-11e2-8845-d970ccb04497_story.html
There's an android malware discussion one article up on the front page which would benefit from your pointed and unbiased opinion. I will wait patiently for your post.
out of the banks hands and put right back into the economy by the perps. Nothings to see, move along....
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
Given that likelihood that a fair number of these bottled machines were made vulnerable by flaws in MSoft software, it is nice to see MSoft talking some action to help clean up their mess.
Sorry, do you think key loggers are impossible on Linux or something?
Still waiting. Tick tock.
A car made by GM probably will explode if attacked by hostile parties.
THL phish sticks
It seems I'm the only one who questions such things, but:
On whose authority was this action pursued?
Since when does the FBI or MSFT or RIAA or MPAA or North Korea or Anonymous or [etc] have a right to diddle with others computers?
What gives them (for any incarnation of "them") the authority to modify privately-owned computers?
If it's for the indiscriminate greater good, then that seems more like military action...which I don't think the FBI is authorized to deal with, and certainly not any private US-based company.
(To be clear: I'm happy whenever I hear about a botnet being destroyed. But I'm unhappy whenever I see the government or anyone else assuming authority where none has been granted.)
Kid-proof tablet..
"Sorry, do you think key loggers are impossible on Linux or something?"
No. I'm simply stating that this specific key-logger is focused on windows systems.
For platform-specific malware I it would be good always mentioning which platforms it affects.
Given that likelihood that a fair number of these bottled machines were made vulnerable by flaws in MSoft software, it is nice to see MSoft talking some action to help clean up their mess.
More like Microsoft is having to spend resources to clean up the mess the developers in their ecosystem have created.
Java, Flash and Acrobat. Those are the three big vectors. A Windows machine with none of the three will be pretty damn safe.
So do we want corporations enforcing the law? Especially since corporations, through lobbying efforts, buy laws in the first place. In this case, botnets exist because security problems MS themselves put into their software. So MS creates a problem, and gets itself deputized to solve the problem? Imagine the MPAA and RIAA being deputized to enforce laws they bought and paid to have written.
Still nothing. I guess that just confirms you are a shill, the worst kind like you accuse Microsoft of employing all over this site.
http://www.truthorfiction.com/rumors/b/butter-margarine.htm#.UbHzapyrOZE
The Truth:
The heart of this eRumor, the comparison between butter and Margarine, has been circulating since 2005. Later versions added the tidbit about Margarine being manufactured to fatten turkeys.
We'll go through the email one fact at time but it needs to be kept in mind that not every Margarine product is the same. There are other spreads that are loosely called Margarine but may, for example, be part vegetable oil or a fat-free Margarine product.
1. Margarine was originally manufactured to fatten turkeys. When it killed The turkeys, the people who had put all the money into the research wanted a Payback so they put their heads together to figure out what to do with this Product to get their money back. It was a white substance with no food Appeal so they added the yellow coloring and sold it to people to use in Place of butter. How do you like it? They have come out with some clever New flavorings-Fiction!
According to the National Association of Margarine Manufacturers, Margarine was the idea of a Frenchman named Hippolyte Mege-Mouriez in response to a request from Emperor Louis Napoleon for ideas for a substitute for butter. In 1869 he used margaric acid and the name of his formulation became known as Margarine. It became a hit in the United States in the late 1800's.
2. Both have the same amount of calories-Truth!
A tablespoon of butter is 100 calories. A tablespoon of Margarine is 100 calories.
3. Eating margarine can increase heart disease in women by 53% over eating the same amount of butter, according to a recent Harvard Medical Study-Truth! But Updated!
We didn't find the "53%" study, but Harvard School of Public Health has published a report on this. It says that more than 30 years ago research indicated that saturated fat (such as in butter) was bad for the heart and people were told to switch to margarine. A Harvard study of women between 1980 and 1994 found a significant reduction of heart disease risk by reducing smoking, hormone treatment, and dietary improvements including reducing or eliminating saturated fat (such as in butter.) Further research has shown, however, that some margarines contained trans fat, which was even worse for the heart than saturated fat. The report cautions us not to make decisions as a result of just one study but to consider the body of recent research about an issue like butter versus margarine.
4. Butter is slightly higher in saturated fats at 8 grams compared to 5 Grams-Truth!
A tablespoon of butter is 7g of saturated fat. A tablespoon of margarine is 2g of saturated fat.
5. Eating butter increases the absorption of many other nutrients in other Foods-Unproven!
We could not find anything definitive about this.
6. Butter has many nutritional benefits where margarine has a few only because they are added!
It depends on what you are measuring. The advantage of butter is that it is a more natural product than margarine and does have more vitamin content. But butter is high in saturated fat, which is associated with increased heart attack risk. Saturated fats are the ones that are solid at room temperature and increase the "bad" cholesterol (LDL) as well as the "good" cholesterol (HDL). The disadvantage of true margarine is the trans fat level. The more solid a margarine is at room temperature, the more trans fat it contains, as much as 3 grams per tablespoon. Margarine makers have responded to that by releasing tub or liquid products that have either reduced or eliminated trans fats. Watch for the labels. Heart doctors recommend butter over normal margarine but recommend trans fat free margarines over butter. It all gets very confusing. There are even margarine products now that say they actually lower cholesterol.
7. Butter tastes much better than margarine and it can enhance the flavors of other foods-A Matter of Personal Taste!
8. Butter has been around for centuries where marg
I'm not sure what angle that is supposed to go. It feels like an initial kick in the junk, followed by a good job by helping foil the bot-net.
Takedown is a noun.
Take down is the phrasal verb your title is looking for.
Margarine is but ONE MOLECULE away from being PLASTIC...
That's true. In much the same way that pure water is but ONE MOLECULE away from being SULFURIC ACID.
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife