BITS is just yet another way of delivering software to your machine. It's supposed to allow you to download stuff like updates without hogging all your bandwidth. Works well on cable/dsl. Dial up or ISDN, not so much. There are other companies that use BITS for various other applications, for example Sony OE uses it when they are rolling out a big big patch in SW: Galaxies to roll parts of it out early, in theory while you are playing without impacting your game. Again, on Dial up or ISDN that doesn't work so well, so they let you turn it off. Imho it was only a matter of time before BITS was hijacked for this purpose. I'm not saying I saw this coming, I really hadn't thought about it, but it's just another vector for malware to get to the internet and download software to your machine. A vector that is normally 'trusted'.
Again, the kicker is that (as I understand things) there has to already be some program (malware) on your computer to request additional malware through BITS. That malware could conceivably be a Java or ActiveX program running in your browser, or something an exploit causes to be dropped and run. BITS is not an attack vector in and of itself at this time.
I imagine Vista would probably pop up a confirmation window about allowing something access to BITS if you were running as a low-privilage user, but I'm not sure.
As I understand it, diesel engines work best (most efficiently) within a narrow range of RPM. Advances in the last 20-30 years have significantly increased the range and overall effectiveness of the diesel engine, but it occurs to me (and in fact occured to me when I first ran across mention of hybrids) that the optimal engine for a hybrid is probably a diesel engine. It's too bad they will never be adopted as such. At least I seriously doubt it.
A few interetsing tales:
The miracle network: A customer complains that a couple of their machines are very slow on the network. Even internet (via cable modem patched into the network) is slow for those machine. I go over there and start checking things... both machines are generating packet loss to anywhere else on the network, and the network drops which run all the way across the building are direct runs. No wall jacks or anything. I grab our cable tester and hook up to the first cable ends here and in the wireing closet (everything is labeled). It shows no connection. None.
I plug it back in and realize I get no light on the switch for that jack. Mark down everything, and do the 'connect-disconnect' light shuffle... the switches lights don't change. Property owner assures me that the only network equipment is in this room, and the runs are all straight, no additional switches.
We begin tracing the cables through his dropped ceilings, all nicely zip tied together and of course all the same color cables. We find nothing out of the ordinary, and even peer down the wall space where the drop comes down with a flashlight... maybe there is a hub or switch?
Get back in and trace the cable which runs into a hole drilled into a desk, out another hole in the desk, under a several hundered pound file drawer... what's this.. 3 FEET of cable covered by what looks like a whole roll of black electrical tape.
So figuring we have a bad splice, we trim that out, use some punchdown splice blocks we had to add in a segment to replace the taped mess, and bingo, it all works.
The punch line? After pulling all that tape off, one of the other techs discover the splice was made by stripping the outer jacket off of 2 feet on each end of each cable, and wraping the still insulated wires together. All their network connectivitiy for that computer was by inductive coupling.
Computer 2 had a similar problem, having also been moved. There however they were a bit more professional. They went out and purchased a 10' cat5 patch cable, and sheared most of the plastic off the connector with a knife, then taped the two connectors together pin to pin.
The exploding server: We work on a lot of machines. A server comes in from someone who is not normally a customer, but needs the machine back pronto as it has all their customer data on it. They shut it off last night and now it won't power on.
The tech wipes it off with a dry cloth before putting it on the server desk because it is filthy with crud. Plugs it up, and turns it on about the time I'm going back there to work on another machine we have back there. It looked like something out of a hollywood film. Sparks flew out of the power supply, things snapped, awful smells came forth, then the circuit breaker on the UPS tripped.
The server came from a machine shop and had been out on the floor. The entire machine, inside and out, was covered with dust sized flecks of metal. When they brought it here, the metal shifted around and formed shorts when we powered it on. They also needed it back up and running within 3-5 hours.
Their hard drive was fortunatly not a casualty, and we were able to move it to another box.
You give us 5% packet loss like everyone else, we go elsewhere again: Local business has two offices. One served by the cable company, one for 6 months by us via dsl (cable company who set up network in first place doesn't reach them). They have a business app that is not networked, they simply run a VNC session from the remote office. VNC appears to be unhappy with 5% packet loss.
Customer came to us because their previous provider was handing them constant 5% packet loss on their DSL circuit. They assured us it was the provider's fault and not hardware or the other end, and with the standard disclaimers (the phone company is notoriously reluctant to fix dsl lines that work 'mostly right' around here) we set up their internet. Less than a week later they call, VNC won't stay connected.
So I start nosing around from their router.
Router-> us, ping for 24 hours, o
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BITS is just yet another way of delivering software to your machine. It's supposed to allow you to download stuff like updates without hogging all your bandwidth. Works well on cable/dsl. Dial up or ISDN, not so much. There are other companies that use BITS for various other applications, for example Sony OE uses it when they are rolling out a big big patch in SW: Galaxies to roll parts of it out early, in theory while you are playing without impacting your game. Again, on Dial up or ISDN that doesn't work so well, so they let you turn it off. Imho it was only a matter of time before BITS was hijacked for this purpose. I'm not saying I saw this coming, I really hadn't thought about it, but it's just another vector for malware to get to the internet and download software to your machine. A vector that is normally 'trusted'.
Again, the kicker is that (as I understand things) there has to already be some program (malware) on your computer to request additional malware through BITS. That malware could conceivably be a Java or ActiveX program running in your browser, or something an exploit causes to be dropped and run. BITS is not an attack vector in and of itself at this time.
I imagine Vista would probably pop up a confirmation window about allowing something access to BITS if you were running as a low-privilage user, but I'm not sure.
As I understand it, diesel engines work best (most efficiently) within a narrow range of RPM. Advances in the last 20-30 years have significantly increased the range and overall effectiveness of the diesel engine, but it occurs to me (and in fact occured to me when I first ran across mention of hybrids) that the optimal engine for a hybrid is probably a diesel engine. It's too bad they will never be adopted as such. At least I seriously doubt it.
A few interetsing tales: The miracle network: A customer complains that a couple of their machines are very slow on the network. Even internet (via cable modem patched into the network) is slow for those machine. I go over there and start checking things... both machines are generating packet loss to anywhere else on the network, and the network drops which run all the way across the building are direct runs. No wall jacks or anything. I grab our cable tester and hook up to the first cable ends here and in the wireing closet (everything is labeled). It shows no connection. None. I plug it back in and realize I get no light on the switch for that jack. Mark down everything, and do the 'connect-disconnect' light shuffle... the switches lights don't change. Property owner assures me that the only network equipment is in this room, and the runs are all straight, no additional switches. We begin tracing the cables through his dropped ceilings, all nicely zip tied together and of course all the same color cables. We find nothing out of the ordinary, and even peer down the wall space where the drop comes down with a flashlight... maybe there is a hub or switch? Get back in and trace the cable which runs into a hole drilled into a desk, out another hole in the desk, under a several hundered pound file drawer... what's this.. 3 FEET of cable covered by what looks like a whole roll of black electrical tape. So figuring we have a bad splice, we trim that out, use some punchdown splice blocks we had to add in a segment to replace the taped mess, and bingo, it all works. The punch line? After pulling all that tape off, one of the other techs discover the splice was made by stripping the outer jacket off of 2 feet on each end of each cable, and wraping the still insulated wires together. All their network connectivitiy for that computer was by inductive coupling. Computer 2 had a similar problem, having also been moved. There however they were a bit more professional. They went out and purchased a 10' cat5 patch cable, and sheared most of the plastic off the connector with a knife, then taped the two connectors together pin to pin. The exploding server: We work on a lot of machines. A server comes in from someone who is not normally a customer, but needs the machine back pronto as it has all their customer data on it. They shut it off last night and now it won't power on. The tech wipes it off with a dry cloth before putting it on the server desk because it is filthy with crud. Plugs it up, and turns it on about the time I'm going back there to work on another machine we have back there. It looked like something out of a hollywood film. Sparks flew out of the power supply, things snapped, awful smells came forth, then the circuit breaker on the UPS tripped. The server came from a machine shop and had been out on the floor. The entire machine, inside and out, was covered with dust sized flecks of metal. When they brought it here, the metal shifted around and formed shorts when we powered it on. They also needed it back up and running within 3-5 hours. Their hard drive was fortunatly not a casualty, and we were able to move it to another box. You give us 5% packet loss like everyone else, we go elsewhere again: Local business has two offices. One served by the cable company, one for 6 months by us via dsl (cable company who set up network in first place doesn't reach them). They have a business app that is not networked, they simply run a VNC session from the remote office. VNC appears to be unhappy with 5% packet loss. Customer came to us because their previous provider was handing them constant 5% packet loss on their DSL circuit. They assured us it was the provider's fault and not hardware or the other end, and with the standard disclaimers (the phone company is notoriously reluctant to fix dsl lines that work 'mostly right' around here) we set up their internet. Less than a week later they call, VNC won't stay connected. So I start nosing around from their router. Router-> us, ping for 24 hours, o