Re:Interesting point of departure...
on
Netscape 6.2
·
· Score: 1
Not to mention SCO^H^H^HCaldera OpenServer^H^H^H^H^H^HUnix that now ships with a 'Linux Kernel Personality' that allegedly runs Linux binaries faster than Linux. See this release about Oracle 9i.
Does that have any releation to "Genuine People Personalities" from the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation?
This is an excellent point. Microsoft are just cheapening the word here. Terrorism is death, violence, suffering - no virus has ever caused these things. That's not to say that virus writers shouldn't pay the price for the havoc they cause.
Is anyone else worried about how easily words like 'terrorism' and 'atrocity' and 'holocaust' get wheeled out by CNN and BBC. Nowadays anything remotely unpleasant gets called an atrocity. We're going to have to come up with some new words for the really bad stuff that happens.
A very large number of the dot-com bombs were really failures. They were failures because they were set up by people with a short-term aim to live off gullible VC cash for a while.
The real problem with the wireless world is that it costs megabucks to build the infrastructure, but the stuff it is delivering is only worth toy prices. It's the same with mobile phones. People only buy stuff like this when they can do it out of petty cash.
Every legal act has two facets - the act itself and the mental state of the actor. If you read the act itself you will see that the restriction on providing information that may circumvent protection is in fact only a restriction on providing information in order to circumvent protection.
Clearly this implies that some kind of context must be taken into account and therefore that the provision of information expressly to fix security holes is completely the opposite of an illegal action.
Look at the wording - primarily designed... limited purpose other than to circumvent... marketed... for use in circumventing.
Too much of the comment against attempts to clamp down on illegal computer use tends to ignore the essential fact that intent is an important part of any law - often more important than the act itself.
I quote from the DMCA s1201(b)
''(b) ADDITIONAL VIOLATIONS.--(1) No person shall manufacture,
import, offer to the public, provide, or otherwise traffic in any
technology, product, service, device, component, or part thereof,
that--
''(A) is primarily designed or produced for the purpose
of circumventing protection afforded by a technological measure
that effectively protects a right of a copyright owner under
this title in a work or a portion thereof;
''(B) has only limited commercially significant purpose or
use other than to circumvent protection afforded by a techno-logical
measure that effectively protects a right of a copyright
owner under this title in a work or a portion thereof; or
''(C) is marketed by that person or another acting in concert
with that person with that person's knowledge for use in cir-cumventing
protection afforded by a technological measure that
effectively protects a right of a copyright owner under this
title in a work or a portion thereof.
Someone has probably said this elsewhere, but I'll point it out again: VBScript is not a component of Outlook. Any mail system that offers you the opportunity to "Launch" or "Run" an attachment would allow the virus to execute. Any mail system that can support OLE automation could be called upon to automate the distribution of the virus. VBS is a part of Windows and in that respect the behaviour of VBS files is identical to.exe files.
It would be possible to write VBS that sends mail by initiating an SMTP conversation with an SMTP server. It would be possible to write a shell script that does something like what this virus does. It would be possible to implement this virus as an exe file. There are a million and one excellent things you could do with VBS, even VBS fired off from an email message.
The real problem is users. The easiest way to crack a system is to let someone else do it for you. If you can persuade a user to run something, you are the user. If you can persuade a superuser to run something, you've got root. The people are the weak link and need indoctrinating.
Linux is not targeted because it is not widely used. As more people use free unixes, the average standard of security implementations across all installations will go down. The number of people running everything as root will probably go up. Education is required.
It makes me proud to be a techie. Another major civil liberties issue reduced to an argument about coding. Maybe Amnesty International should just throw in the towel and get MCSEs. Are the Perl Monks in fact a humanitarian organisation?
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Not to mention SCO^H^H^HCaldera OpenServer^H^H^H^H^H^HUnix that now ships with a 'Linux Kernel Personality' that allegedly runs Linux binaries faster than Linux. See this release about Oracle 9i.
Does that have any releation to "Genuine People Personalities" from the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation?
This is an excellent point. Microsoft are just cheapening the word here. Terrorism is death, violence, suffering - no virus has ever caused these things. That's not to say that virus writers shouldn't pay the price for the havoc they cause.
Is anyone else worried about how easily words like 'terrorism' and 'atrocity' and 'holocaust' get wheeled out by CNN and BBC. Nowadays anything remotely unpleasant gets called an atrocity. We're going to have to come up with some new words for the really bad stuff that happens.
A very large number of the dot-com bombs were really failures. They were failures because they were set up by people with a short-term aim to live off gullible VC cash for a while.
The real problem with the wireless world is that it costs megabucks to build the infrastructure, but the stuff it is delivering is only worth toy prices. It's the same with mobile phones. People only buy stuff like this when they can do it out of petty cash.
Every legal act has two facets - the act itself and the mental state of the actor. If you read the act itself you will see that the restriction on providing information that may circumvent protection is in fact only a restriction on providing information in order to circumvent protection.
... limited purpose other than to circumvent ... marketed ... for use in circumventing.
Clearly this implies that some kind of context must be taken into account and therefore that the provision of information expressly to fix security holes is completely the opposite of an illegal action.
Look at the wording - primarily designed
Too much of the comment against attempts to clamp down on illegal computer use tends to ignore the essential fact that intent is an important part of any law - often more important than the act itself.
I quote from the DMCA s1201(b)
''(b) ADDITIONAL VIOLATIONS.--(1) No person shall manufacture,
import, offer to the public, provide, or otherwise traffic in any
technology, product, service, device, component, or part thereof,
that--
''(A) is primarily designed or produced for the purpose
of circumventing protection afforded by a technological measure
that effectively protects a right of a copyright owner under
this title in a work or a portion thereof;
''(B) has only limited commercially significant purpose or
use other than to circumvent protection afforded by a techno-logical
measure that effectively protects a right of a copyright
owner under this title in a work or a portion thereof; or
''(C) is marketed by that person or another acting in concert
with that person with that person's knowledge for use in cir-cumventing
protection afforded by a technological measure that
effectively protects a right of a copyright owner under this
title in a work or a portion thereof.
I thought there already was a Barbie on every beach in California. Several, in fact, and a considerable number of Kens too.
Counting ballots?
Someone has probably said this elsewhere, but I'll point it out again: .exe files.
VBScript is not a component of Outlook. Any mail system that offers you the opportunity to "Launch" or "Run" an attachment would allow the virus to execute. Any mail system that can support OLE automation could be called upon to automate the distribution of the virus. VBS is a part of Windows and in that respect the behaviour of VBS files is identical to
It would be possible to write VBS that sends mail by initiating an SMTP conversation with an SMTP server. It would be possible to write a shell script that does something like what this virus does. It would be possible to implement this virus as an exe file. There are a million and one excellent things you could do with VBS, even VBS fired off from an email message.
The real problem is users. The easiest way to crack a system is to let someone else do it for you. If you can persuade a user to run something, you are the user. If you can persuade a superuser to run something, you've got root. The people are the weak link and need indoctrinating.
Linux is not targeted because it is not widely used. As more people use free unixes, the average standard of security implementations across all installations will go down. The number of people running everything as root will probably go up. Education is required.
It makes me proud to be a techie. Another major civil liberties issue reduced to an argument about coding. Maybe Amnesty International should just throw in the towel and get MCSEs. Are the Perl Monks in fact a humanitarian organisation?