There's more OSX and Linux malware out there than you might think. Especially OSX.
One of the Windows users I work with says the same thing. Like you, he can't provide any examples either.
And if you're talking about those instances of trojans that rely on social engineering, what anti-virus program can defend against a user who willingly types in an administrative password and installs the malware on his own?
Well if we are excluding those...
There's 90% of Windows malware wiped out. The user is, always has been and will always be the biggest source of infection. Even in the Windows world and especially today when a patched Win 7 and Office suite aren't vulnerable to drive by infections.
I love how Mac fanboys need to move the goal posts to justify their positions. But here you go anyway.
A computer can still pass on a virus even if it cannot directly infect you. It might not be your responsibility but will a child know this? If he forwards an attachment unwittingly or something?
Linux users and Mac users could accidentally infect a Windows user.
In my experience, Mac users are even more irresponsible then clueless Windows users. They think they are magically protected, which means they will ignore obvious signs of infection till the very end.
As we all know, malware is less about doing damage and more about making money these days. Keyloggers, trojans and spambots exist for OSX these days (as well as Linux) but they focus on staying hidden as their job is to make money, not make people annoyed which means they need to stay where they are to collect CC numbers or send spam.
Linux users should not have a problem with AV. Even if they are smart enough not to need it. Linux users already think with a security focused mind, as an effect using Linux in lieu of a AV client is laziness on our part (granted, we can recognise an infected machine, so we can afford a bit of laziness).
To use a Zombie virus analogy, Windows users are the ones running about in a mad panic as the Zombie hoard approaches, blocking highways and running to get away. Mac users walk towards them saying, "Zombies dont exist on Mac, I could never get infected". Linux users fled to the hills six months ago with as much fuel, food and porn as they could carry.
I've used FaceTime between my iPhone and a Mac, and it's quite nice, but it seems like it could be a big boon to someone to start selling FaceTime enabled video chat on the Android market.
Selling?
I'd damn well expect to get that for free. Hackers would take a for sale client as an affront.
I also expect Apple to hit back. They don't like Android, Apple will probably use something like a DCMA violation as a cudgel. Remember that Apple have said they'd enable it to be used as a standard, they haven't open sourced or opened the spec on anything. In reality this promise is worth the paper it's written on, Apple don't want Android competing on an equal footing.
When that happens, watch the Android Facetime client source get published, if it was not open already. Hilarity ensues.
One of my few serious complaints about Android is a serious lack of BlueTooth support. Except for normal phone calls and streaming music you can all but forget it.
Bluetooth File Transfer, formerly Medival Bluetooth FTP works fine without root on every phone I've had (HTC Dream, Motorola Milestone, HTC Desire Z).
If you've got root you can do a lot more. I think there may even be BT tethering w/o the requirement for Root access but I've never looked into this in any detail.
Perhaps you were thinking of an OS which competes with Android and has a lot of restrictions.
It's why you change the title with each post you make. Most of us have noticed.
Lets say magically you convinced a company to pay workers at a chinese assembly plant the same wages they would get in the U.S.
You're using the same logical fallacy as the AC. Except it's even less thought out.
You're preventing other options from existing in your example by means of using loaded language. What happens if China begins a push towards workers rights. Europe as a whole did this in about 50 years. China wont even need a revolution, all they need is for the idea to be popular in government. In fact they've already planned for it, why do you think the Chines have such an interest in East African politics?
You're using the same argument that there can only be one outcome and all other options must be blanked out.
By trying to raise either side of that equation you drive companies to other parts of the world and instead of helping, you are putting people out of work.
Now this is just a justification to help yourself with the decision you've already made.
This is a fallacious argument designed to alleviate yourself of guilt. Bad things are justified because a potential alternative is worse, the problem with this thinking is that you've had to deny the possibility of other options in order to accomplish this.
There are alternatives, you simply don't want to accept them because it would require you giving up or admitting something you don't want to..
Japan, South Korea and Taiwan have all got a modicum of labour rights with the ability to produce cheap stuff. Taiwan and Japan will actually hold a company to account over serious problems.
Aren't the conditions less harsh then the employees' alternatives? Would you rather them go do something else?
That's a very bad and obvious strawman, even for an AC.
It frames the argument by presenting a binary choice that is not explained. You _must_ choose between something bad or something unknown that is _worse_.
What this ignores is that there are more options, such as fair pay and conditions. However this would cause prices to rise which is why people dont like it and dismiss it as an option. A binary choice is bad as it deflects attention away from choices you find uncomfortable but may actually be better as well as alternatives you haven't thought of.
I once was asked this by a Philipina girl.
"why are Kano [American] rich and Pinoy [Philipino] poor?"
The best answer I could think of was education. I responded. ME "how many years of school did you finish?" HER "I didn't go to school, too expensive" ME "who taught you to read and write" HER "My Uncle"
Education in general is not as bad as this in the Philipines, this girl was from Samar, the poorest province of Luzon but it's nowhere near the 12 years we get at practically no cost in the west. BTW, I'm Australian not American, Kano (Americano) has just evolved into a name for all us whities.
Failure to adhere up to the terms of a contract can be a crime in certain jurisdictions.
Economic crimes should not be tolerated just because no one gets physically hurt.
Welcome to Asia, where economic crimes aren't just tolerated, they're encouraged.
My money is on nothing of note happening to this guy. He might get fired, in which case he'll just get a new job at the factory down the street. Police wont charge him because he's go no money (for "tea money").
The true economic crimes such as the harsh conditions products are made in are also ignored.
And the graphics card is only required if you want Aero. At least in theory Vista and later will work on most computers from 2000 or so that have enough RAM and HD space, partly because it can use XP/2000 drivers.
Lets be honest with ourselves, Vista was a pile of crap (slow, buggy) which is why the GGP chose it instead of Win 7. Win 7 is vastly improved.
A 2003 Vintage PC at least has IMHO a 50/50 chance of running Win 7, at the very least Win 7 will install (cant say if it would run though).
(And wow... never knew how much we got ripped off in Australia - the AUD is worth the same or slightly more than the CAD, but our prices are ~$200 more than in Canada. Argh!)
Actually this is only for Iphones.
I recently bought a HTC Desire Z from Smooth Mobile and paid about A$20 more then I would have for a European import.
Also at $550 delivered, it's almost half the cost of an Iphone with a more modern 45 nm processor.
I think it's time to admit, that with an Iphone, you just get ripped off.
The iPhone 3G has an off-the-shelf 400 MHz CPU with 128MB RAM. The current model, iPhone 4, has a custom-designed 1 GHz CPU and 256 MB RAM. Is anyone really surprised that an OS designed to make the most of the latter is beyond the abilities of the former?
No, not surprised at all...
But Apple fanboys made a very big deal out of the fact old Iphones get updates where other phones do not and were very vocal about it. Now this is coming back to bite them in the arse.
In most cases G4 hardware that started on Panther (10.3) were eligible for two major OS upgrades. By comparison, how many PCs that started out with XP in 2003 were able to be upgraded to Windows 7 in 2009? Heck how many of them were really Vista compatible and not "Vista Ready". Very few.
My last three gaming PC's have been "Vista Ready" so thats almost 7 years of machines and my 2004 gaming rig was not top of the line (AMD 64 3800, 2GB RAM, Geforce 6600) so not that uncommon.
In fact, my housemate's GF is running that PC using Windows 7 and she's got no complaints. Only non-original component is the HDD.
Plenty of 2003-2004 vintage PC's can run Windows 7 (nice trick using Vista, but Win 7 is the current OS) because a lot of them ran dedicated graphics cards (ye olde days before the Intel IGM actually got good enough to use).
Compare the current resale values of other personal computers with a similar MSRP from the same era with a G5 and you'll see that the Mac has far and away more residual value.
Which is why offices are full of them.
No, wait...
They aren't.
Resale value is pointless when operational life is short. Tthe resale value of a device which is unique and out of production for 5 years with no modern successor is not comparable to a device that was commonplace which has a successor with the same architecture.
In other words, they are worth more money because they are less common and less used. Niche devices always sell for more, that does not make them more valuable.
Now Intel based Mac's are completely bucking this trend. They are going for the same as a 3 year old Dell. By switching to Intel, they now have the same operational life and yes, I've met plenty of people who use the same laptop for 5 years. Last week I re-imaged a Pentium IV laptop that had an inbuilt floppy drive for a client.
Yes, I know there are areas where Andriod is superior to the iPhone...but the iPhone is still the measuring stick Android is held to, and carrier shitware is an area where Andriod falls horribly short.
This is only a problem for users in the US. In Europe or Australia we can simply buy phones outright which have no carrier customisations installed.
The problem is that it is never a "well funded crime kingpin" and most often a 15-30 year old or an (ex) employee that noticed some gaping, obvious security flaw. Data breaches like this are rarely the work of huge "cyber gangs" and mostly the work of individuals who noticed some huge flaw that Sony had. The crime kingpins wouldn't bother with something like this because it is a whole lot easier to sell botnets with 3nl@rg3 y0ur p3n15 spam.
Twenty years ago you may have been right, but these days botnets are a multi-million dollar operation, underground black markets sell botnet time just like Amazon sells computer cycles, and cyber-gangs sell credit card numbers for a few dollars a pop. Cracking isn't the sole province of bored kids typing away from their parents' basement any more; it's an industry, staffed by professionals.
You are quite correct but the GP is still likely to be right about the cause.
There is a big industry around cybercrime, sending spam, buying exploits and botnet time but the GP is right where they just dont target things like PSN because of the cost of the operation. It's cheaper to hire a botnet and send millions of C@n@d1@n P@rm@cy ads at everyone as the return on investment is much higher then going after a target with lots of money (ergo lots of security).
Exploits into big networks mostly come from disgruntled (ex)employees who are just as likely to use it for petty revenge as they are to sell it on the black market. Also employees are very vulnerable to social engineering, someone could have unwittingly given a third party access to the info they needed to find this exploit.
Second to that, individual or small groups of black hats also tend to be the ones that find the exploits and sell them, except they dont live in basements any more, they've got their own 2 by 4 McMansion.
Sony's corporate security will be going over every employee's file right now with a fine tooth comb.
About then I realize that only in the Zone can you walk right past a bunch of giant warning signs, into a room full of enough electricity to kill you faster than the speed of light, and the only thing out of the ordinary enough to make you notice is a blood sucking mutant taking a whiz."
Bought the two big titles that came out a week ago. Can't play Mortal Kombat on my PS3 because PSN is down. Can't play Portal 2 on my Xbox360 because it red ringed on me. Isn't the latest technology grand?
Oh Hai,
I didn't notice all your problems before because I was too busy having fun on my gaming PC.
But I'll correct you again.
Android has a cache of recently used locations that is overwritten fairly regularly. This information stays on the device. You need root level access to read the data.
Apple is maintaining a database of locations that extends back for months. This information is transferred off the device. From here, anyone can read the data with a simple application.
Also, the services that Google uses to track you are opt-in. You have to expressly accept the terms and conditions when install/first use Google applications. Apple did not make it known that they were even doing this.
Slashdot Mirror
One of the Windows users I work with says the same thing. Like you, he can't provide any examples either.
And if you're talking about those instances of trojans that rely on social engineering, what anti-virus program can defend against a user who willingly types in an administrative password and installs the malware on his own?
Well if we are excluding those...
There's 90% of Windows malware wiped out. The user is, always has been and will always be the biggest source of infection. Even in the Windows world and especially today when a patched Win 7 and Office suite aren't vulnerable to drive by infections.
I love how Mac fanboys need to move the goal posts to justify their positions. But here you go anyway.
http://about-threats.trendmicro.com/Search.aspx?language=us&p=OSX
No doubt you have some wonderfully convenient excuse to ignore this.
Have fun.
There's more OSX and Linux malware out there than you might think.
Examples?
Here you go.
As always, the most common infection vector is the user. This gets worse when a user refuses to recognise they can be infected.
A computer can still pass on a virus even if it cannot directly infect you. It might not be your responsibility but will a child know this? If he forwards an attachment unwittingly or something?
Linux users and Mac users could accidentally infect a Windows user.
In my experience, Mac users are even more irresponsible then clueless Windows users. They think they are magically protected, which means they will ignore obvious signs of infection till the very end.
As we all know, malware is less about doing damage and more about making money these days. Keyloggers, trojans and spambots exist for OSX these days (as well as Linux) but they focus on staying hidden as their job is to make money, not make people annoyed which means they need to stay where they are to collect CC numbers or send spam.
Linux users should not have a problem with AV. Even if they are smart enough not to need it. Linux users already think with a security focused mind, as an effect using Linux in lieu of a AV client is laziness on our part (granted, we can recognise an infected machine, so we can afford a bit of laziness).
To use a Zombie virus analogy, Windows users are the ones running about in a mad panic as the Zombie hoard approaches, blocking highways and running to get away. Mac users walk towards them saying, "Zombies dont exist on Mac, I could never get infected". Linux users fled to the hills six months ago with as much fuel, food and porn as they could carry.
Turnbullabad. Costellogood.
Still a bit miffed we missed out on the comedic political duo of Abbott and Costello.
"Hey, where are my virgins? ...And what is Hitler doing with that pineapple?" - Osama Bin Laden
Why am I a dung beetle, exactly which elephants behind am I attached to.
rm -f /bin/laden
Good Sir,
Had I not already commented on this thread, I would have modded that up.
Per the announcement, it was in Abbottabad, which is nowhere near Islamabad. (It's near Peshawar.)
Abbott is the last name of the federal opposition leader in Australia.
If there is a Costelloabad or Turnbullabad anywhere the Liberal party (big L, they are conservatives) may be in serious trouble.
I've used FaceTime between my iPhone and a Mac, and it's quite nice, but it seems like it could be a big boon to someone to start selling FaceTime enabled video chat on the Android market.
Selling?
I'd damn well expect to get that for free. Hackers would take a for sale client as an affront.
I also expect Apple to hit back. They don't like Android, Apple will probably use something like a DCMA violation as a cudgel. Remember that Apple have said they'd enable it to be used as a standard, they haven't open sourced or opened the spec on anything. In reality this promise is worth the paper it's written on, Apple don't want Android competing on an equal footing.
When that happens, watch the Android Facetime client source get published, if it was not open already. Hilarity ensues.
it's nearly useless.
One of my few serious complaints about Android is a serious lack of BlueTooth support. Except for normal phone calls and streaming music you can all but forget it.
You were saying?,
Bluetooth File Transfer, formerly Medival Bluetooth FTP works fine without root on every phone I've had (HTC Dream, Motorola Milestone, HTC Desire Z).
If you've got root you can do a lot more. I think there may even be BT tethering w/o the requirement for Root access but I've never looked into this in any detail.
Perhaps you were thinking of an OS which competes with Android and has a lot of restrictions.
You're using the same logical fallacy as the AC. Except it's even less thought out.
You're preventing other options from existing in your example by means of using loaded language. What happens if China begins a push towards workers rights. Europe as a whole did this in about 50 years. China wont even need a revolution, all they need is for the idea to be popular in government. In fact they've already planned for it, why do you think the Chines have such an interest in East African politics?
You're using the same argument that there can only be one outcome and all other options must be blanked out.
Now this is just a justification to help yourself with the decision you've already made.
This is a fallacious argument designed to alleviate yourself of guilt. Bad things are justified because a potential alternative is worse, the problem with this thinking is that you've had to deny the possibility of other options in order to accomplish this.
There are alternatives, you simply don't want to accept them because it would require you giving up or admitting something you don't want to..
Japan, South Korea and Taiwan have all got a modicum of labour rights with the ability to produce cheap stuff. Taiwan and Japan will actually hold a company to account over serious problems.
Aren't the conditions less harsh then the employees' alternatives? Would you rather them go do something else?
That's a very bad and obvious strawman, even for an AC.
It frames the argument by presenting a binary choice that is not explained. You _must_ choose between something bad or something unknown that is _worse_.
What this ignores is that there are more options, such as fair pay and conditions. However this would cause prices to rise which is why people dont like it and dismiss it as an option. A binary choice is bad as it deflects attention away from choices you find uncomfortable but may actually be better as well as alternatives you haven't thought of.
I once was asked this by a Philipina girl.
"why are Kano [American] rich and Pinoy [Philipino] poor?"
The best answer I could think of was education. I responded.
ME "how many years of school did you finish?"
HER "I didn't go to school, too expensive"
ME "who taught you to read and write"
HER "My Uncle"
Education in general is not as bad as this in the Philipines, this girl was from Samar, the poorest province of Luzon but it's nowhere near the 12 years we get at practically no cost in the west. BTW, I'm Australian not American, Kano (Americano) has just evolved into a name for all us whities.
Failure to adhere up to the terms of a contract can be a crime in certain jurisdictions.
Economic crimes should not be tolerated just because no one gets physically hurt.
Welcome to Asia, where economic crimes aren't just tolerated, they're encouraged.
My money is on nothing of note happening to this guy. He might get fired, in which case he'll just get a new job at the factory down the street. Police wont charge him because he's go no money (for "tea money").
The true economic crimes such as the harsh conditions products are made in are also ignored.
And the graphics card is only required if you want Aero. At least in theory Vista and later will work on most computers from 2000 or so that have enough RAM and HD space, partly because it can use XP/2000 drivers.
Lets be honest with ourselves, Vista was a pile of crap (slow, buggy) which is why the GGP chose it instead of Win 7. Win 7 is vastly improved.
A 2003 Vintage PC at least has IMHO a 50/50 chance of running Win 7, at the very least Win 7 will install (cant say if it would run though).
(And wow ... never knew how much we got ripped off in Australia - the AUD is worth the same or slightly more than the CAD, but our prices are ~$200 more than in Canada. Argh!)
Actually this is only for Iphones.
I recently bought a HTC Desire Z from Smooth Mobile and paid about A$20 more then I would have for a European import.
Also at $550 delivered, it's almost half the cost of an Iphone with a more modern 45 nm processor.
I think it's time to admit, that with an Iphone, you just get ripped off.
The iPhone 3G has an off-the-shelf 400 MHz CPU with 128MB RAM. The current model, iPhone 4, has a custom-designed 1 GHz CPU and 256 MB RAM. Is anyone really surprised that an OS designed to make the most of the latter is beyond the abilities of the former?
No, not surprised at all...
But Apple fanboys made a very big deal out of the fact old Iphones get updates where other phones do not and were very vocal about it. Now this is coming back to bite them in the arse.
A measure of schadenfreude is permitted here.
My last three gaming PC's have been "Vista Ready" so thats almost 7 years of machines and my 2004 gaming rig was not top of the line (AMD 64 3800, 2GB RAM, Geforce 6600) so not that uncommon.
In fact, my housemate's GF is running that PC using Windows 7 and she's got no complaints. Only non-original component is the HDD.
Plenty of 2003-2004 vintage PC's can run Windows 7 (nice trick using Vista, but Win 7 is the current OS) because a lot of them ran dedicated graphics cards (ye olde days before the Intel IGM actually got good enough to use).
Which is why offices are full of them.
No, wait...
They aren't.
Resale value is pointless when operational life is short. Tthe resale value of a device which is unique and out of production for 5 years with no modern successor is not comparable to a device that was commonplace which has a successor with the same architecture.
In other words, they are worth more money because they are less common and less used. Niche devices always sell for more, that does not make them more valuable.
Now Intel based Mac's are completely bucking this trend. They are going for the same as a 3 year old Dell. By switching to Intel, they now have the same operational life and yes, I've met plenty of people who use the same laptop for 5 years. Last week I re-imaged a Pentium IV laptop that had an inbuilt floppy drive for a client.
This is only a problem for users in the US. In Europe or Australia we can simply buy phones outright which have no carrier customisations installed.
More ironic then funny,
Ironic that their attempts at protecting customer data have been as successful as their DRM.
The problem is that it is never a "well funded crime kingpin" and most often a 15-30 year old or an (ex) employee that noticed some gaping, obvious security flaw. Data breaches like this are rarely the work of huge "cyber gangs" and mostly the work of individuals who noticed some huge flaw that Sony had. The crime kingpins wouldn't bother with something like this because it is a whole lot easier to sell botnets with 3nl@rg3 y0ur p3n15 spam.
Twenty years ago you may have been right, but these days botnets are a multi-million dollar operation, underground black markets sell botnet time just like Amazon sells computer cycles, and cyber-gangs sell credit card numbers for a few dollars a pop. Cracking isn't the sole province of bored kids typing away from their parents' basement any more; it's an industry, staffed by professionals.
You are quite correct but the GP is still likely to be right about the cause. There is a big industry around cybercrime, sending spam, buying exploits and botnet time but the GP is right where they just dont target things like PSN because of the cost of the operation. It's cheaper to hire a botnet and send millions of C@n@d1@n P@rm@cy ads at everyone as the return on investment is much higher then going after a target with lots of money (ergo lots of security).
Exploits into big networks mostly come from disgruntled (ex)employees who are just as likely to use it for petty revenge as they are to sell it on the black market. Also employees are very vulnerable to social engineering, someone could have unwittingly given a third party access to the info they needed to find this exploit.
Second to that, individual or small groups of black hats also tend to be the ones that find the exploits and sell them, except they dont live in basements any more, they've got their own 2 by 4 McMansion.
Sony's corporate security will be going over every employee's file right now with a fine tooth comb.
What company doesn't "react badly" to people trying to get around their DRM?
Haven't seen Valve sue anyone yet.
In fact Valve's Gabe Newell has openly called pirates "unserverd customers".
Yep, no company likes copyright infringement but not all of them perform the massive dick move of suing their own customers.
Looks like science is remarkably hard to kill.
Finally a target worthy of my skill as a hunter.
Jeeves, prepare my shotgun and book me on the fasted boat to the country where Science lives. By Job I'll gut him.
Don't just stand there, come in, come in.
Bought the two big titles that came out a week ago. Can't play Mortal Kombat on my PS3 because PSN is down. Can't play Portal 2 on my Xbox360 because it red ringed on me. Isn't the latest technology grand?
Oh Hai,
I didn't notice all your problems before because I was too busy having fun on my gaming PC.
But I'll correct you again. Android has a cache of recently used locations that is overwritten fairly regularly. This information stays on the device. You need root level access to read the data.
Apple is maintaining a database of locations that extends back for months. This information is transferred off the device. From here, anyone can read the data with a simple application.
Also, the services that Google uses to track you are opt-in. You have to expressly accept the terms and conditions when install/first use Google applications. Apple did not make it known that they were even doing this.