You know what: I hate spam as much as the next guy, but *@#$ it - I'm going to send this to everyone I know with a windows computer. The few who don't concuss themselves will hopefully find it funny enough to send on...
Yes, I know I risk that rath of the Linux folk, and personally I use a Knoppix CD most of the time, but there is a way of building a live CD with a copy of WinXP on that runs *entirely* from the CD. Legally too, it would seem.
http://www.nu2.nu/pebuilder/ has a application that builds a modified, bottable.ISO image to be burnt by your program of choice.
You can add various AV products, network connectivity stuff and Ad-Aware, plus tons of other stuff I can't be bothered to list.
(Apologies for any typos or a bad URL - preview doesn't seem to be working right now...
Well, since everyone else seems to be posting their complaints, here's what I sent:
Firstly, the actual error:
"It has attacked a company based in Utah called SCO, bringing down its website with a barrage of emails sent from countless computers into which the worm had been insinuated, unbeknownst to the users."
This is incorrect - the attack is based on requesting the same web page over and over again, possibly hundreds of times a second. As to it bringing down the website, well, I'll get to that...
There seems to have be a definite lack of research done for this article. Mainly I assume because the author is a business correspondent and not a technology writer.
There has been much speculation as to the origin of the MyDoom virus. Most informed people have come to the conclusion that although the virus is clearly written to attack SCO, it does so as a smokescreen to distract people from it's main purpose. This is, purely and simply, to gain access to the computers of as many users as possible for further nefarious purposes. Most likely this will involve using them as "zombie hosts" which will send out huge quantities of spam emails in an untraceable manner. It is also very likely that whoever wrote this virus did this for the money, not out of mailice as the author suggests. The virus even contains a short message along the lines of "it's nothing personal, I'm just doing my job" supporting this fact.
The author also seems to have missed another very significant point about the mydoom virus. People knew it was coming. It may be "...hard to see how any website could withstand that kind of clever evil." But only if you don't do any research. The virus works in a very specific manner, and whilst SCOs website was indeed unreachable, evidence suggests it became so BEFORE the virus started attacking. Opinions vary as to why, but it seems that they effectively crippled themselves, whilst conituing to claim they were under seige. Also, Microsofts website was not similarly affected, because there exist a number of methods to deflect this sort of attack, especially if you know it is coming.
A huge quantity of information is available on the internet on this subject. I am no expert on this subject by any stretch of the imaginiation, but an hour or so of reading other articles have given what I would like to think of as an informed opinion. Simply typing the "mydoom" into google presents a link to a story on linuxtoday.com (http://linuxtoday.com/news_story.php3?ltsn=2004-0 1-28-026-26-NW-SW-NT) with a wealth of information on this topic. Further information is available from slashdot.org (http://slashdot.org/search.pl?query=sco). My worry however, is not about what those of us who already have an opinion will think. It is about how those who do not have one will think To the average layman, this article effectively says: "This virus was written by a group of malicious linux users for no reason other than to attack SCO, a company they don't like"
Since this story has now been featured on the above site (www.slashdot.org), I am positive that this will be only one of many emails on this subject... I hope that most of them will be polite, but I suspect that this will have further "...enraged many people devoted to the Linux operating system." Sensationalist, nothing more. I expect more from the BBC.
Slashdot Mirror
You know what: I hate spam as much as the next guy, but *@#$ it - I'm going to send this to everyone I know with a windows computer. The few who don't concuss themselves will hopefully find it funny enough to send on...
Yes, I know I risk that rath of the Linux folk, and personally I use a Knoppix CD most of the time, but there is a way of building a live CD with a copy of WinXP on that runs *entirely* from the CD. Legally too, it would seem.
http://www.nu2.nu/pebuilder/ has a application that builds a modified, bottable .ISO image to be burnt by your program of choice.
You can add various AV products, network connectivity stuff and Ad-Aware, plus tons of other stuff I can't be bothered to list.
(Apologies for any typos or a bad URL - preview doesn't seem to be working right now...
Just a thought: Might the weak (meek?) inherit the Earth because they are the only ones to stay behind?
Well, since everyone else seems to be posting their complaints, here's what I sent:
0 1-28-026-26-NW-SW-NT) with a wealth of information on this topic. Further information is available from slashdot.org (http://slashdot.org/search.pl?query=sco). My worry however, is not about what those of us who already have an opinion will think. It is about how those who do not have one will think To the average layman, this article effectively says: "This virus was written by a group of malicious linux users for no reason other than to attack SCO, a company they don't like"
Firstly, the actual error:
"It has attacked a company based in Utah called SCO, bringing down its website with a barrage of emails sent from countless computers into which the worm had been insinuated, unbeknownst to the users."
This is incorrect - the attack is based on requesting the same web page over and over again, possibly hundreds of times a second. As to it bringing down the website, well, I'll get to that...
There seems to have be a definite lack of research done for this article. Mainly I assume because the author is a business correspondent and not a technology writer.
There has been much speculation as to the origin of the MyDoom virus. Most informed people have come to the conclusion that although the virus is clearly written to attack SCO, it does so as a smokescreen to distract people from it's main purpose. This is, purely and simply, to gain access to the computers of as many users as possible for further nefarious purposes. Most likely this will involve using them as "zombie hosts" which will send out huge quantities of spam emails in an untraceable manner. It is also very likely that whoever wrote this virus did this for the money, not out of mailice as the author suggests. The virus even contains a short message along the lines of "it's nothing personal, I'm just doing my job" supporting this fact.
The author also seems to have missed another very significant point about the mydoom virus. People knew it was coming. It may be "...hard to see how any website could withstand that kind of clever evil." But only if you don't do any research. The virus works in a very specific manner, and whilst SCOs website was indeed unreachable, evidence suggests it became so BEFORE the virus started attacking. Opinions vary as to why, but it seems that they effectively crippled themselves, whilst conituing to claim they were under seige. Also, Microsofts website was not similarly affected, because there exist a number of methods to deflect this sort of attack, especially if you know it is coming.
A huge quantity of information is available on the internet on this subject. I am no expert on this subject by any stretch of the imaginiation, but an hour or so of reading other articles have given what I would like to think of as an informed opinion. Simply typing the "mydoom" into google presents a link to a story on linuxtoday.com (http://linuxtoday.com/news_story.php3?ltsn=2004-
Since this story has now been featured on the above site (www.slashdot.org), I am positive that this will be only one of many emails on this subject... I hope that most of them will be polite, but I suspect that this will have further "...enraged many people devoted to the Linux operating system." Sensationalist, nothing more. I expect more from the BBC.
Had a go at that myself. Hopefully the slashdot effect will not have flooded their mailbox so badly that nothing gets read...
Also, anyone else notice that the author of the article is a business correspondent?