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Offlinescriptflippin
Stranger

Registered: 01/21/09
Posts: 137
Last seen: 15 years, 1 month
Re: New Windows Virus Run Rampant - 8 Million Infections In Four Days [Re: Stonehenge]
    #9691841 - 01/27/09 10:11 PM (15 years, 1 month ago)

Run Linux. For every 100,000 written for windows there are 1 written for Linux. It's just a waste and people know it.

If you do not want to take the time to learn it completely you can simply dual boot Windows with Linux only using Linux to browse the internet and Windows for other things.

It's what I do a lot of the time. I say it all the time but it's worth it. :shrug:

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InvisibleDiploidM
Cuban


Folding@home Statistics
Registered: 01/09/03
Posts: 19,274
Loc: Rabbit Hole
Microsoft Offers $250,000 Reward for Virus Author [Re: Diploid]
    #9789666 - 02/13/09 09:10 AM (15 years, 1 month ago)

If Microsoft put as much effort into doing proper software engineering rather than trying to fix the symptoms of crap engineering after the fact with a big reward, we wouldn't have these problems. Maybe the world should file a class action lawsuit against Microsoft for the damage their bugs keep causing.

This worm exploits, that's right, yet another buffer overflow bug in Microsoft's code. Buffer overflows are the most sophomoric of programming mistakes not worthy of a high school student, let alone a professional software engineer. It's really pathetic how many of these types of stoopid mistakes keep popping up in Microsoft's code. Do they even know what a code review is?

At this point, this worm is now so pervasive, that it might be capable of, on command of its author, bringing down a big chunk of the internet.

--

The spreading Conficker/Downadup worm is now viewed as such a significant threat that it's inspired the formation of a posse to stop it, with Microsoft leading the charge by offering a $250,000 reward to bring the Conficker malware bad guys to justice.

The money will be paid for "information that results in the arrest and conviction of those responsible for illegally launching the Conficker malicious code on the Internet," Microsoft said today in a statement, adding it is fostering a partnership with Internet registries and DNS providers such as ICANN, ORG, and NeuStar as well as security vendors Symantec and Arbor Networks, among others, to stop the Conficker worm once and for all.

"By combining our expertise with the broader community, we can expand the boundaries of defense to better protect people worldwide," said George Stathakopoulos, general manager of Microsoft's Trustworthy Computing Group.

Conficker, also called Downadup, is estimated to have infected at least 10 million PCs. It has been slowly but surely spreading since November. Its main trick is to disable anti-malware protection and block access to anti-malware vendors Web sites.

But security experts are concerned about a potentially much worse second stage of the Conficker worm, as it calls home each day to more than 250 command-and-controls servers around the world as it awaits instructions on future downloads or actions.

"The policy we have here is to target the update mechanism," says Gerry Egan, director of product management for security products and response at Symantec, a member of the stop-Conficker coalition.

While the unique domain names for servers used for Conficker control may constantly change on a daily basis, the anti-Conficker coalition anticipates that by the major domain-name registrars working in collaboration, it may be possible to "take out those domains," or otherwise interfere in the smooth flow of the Conficker operations, says Egan.

A Microsoft spokesperson says Conficker is trying to download malware from these domains and it also uploads infection counts to these domains, but this is not a new trend. A large percentage of these domains are being blocked from being registered. Secondly, a number of the domains are being redirected toward "sinkhole" servers that are owned by trusted research partners around the world. Sinkhole servers allow researchers to observe the worm’s activity, according to Microsoft.

This  partnership between Microsoft, security researchers, ICANN and operators within the domain name system has proactively disabled a significant number of domains targeted by Conficker to disrupt the use of the worm and prevent potential attacks, the Microsoft spokesperson says.

Symantec, which is contributing its malware-analysis expertise to the group, believes there are two main versions of Conficker, "Flavor A" and "Flavor B," which appear to have propagated an additional 450,000 and 1.7 million copies of themselves respectively in the last four days alone.

The full set of participants in the anti-Conficker coalition include: ICANN, NeuStar, VeriSign, CNNIC, Afilias, Public Internet Registry, Global Domains International, M1D Global, AOL, Symantec, F-Secure, ISC, researchers from Georgia Tech, The Shadowserver Foundation, Arbor Networks and Support Intelligence.

While Conficker/Downadup is believed to have spread more prevalently in Asia than elsewhere, some U.S.-based organizations say they've spotted the worm trying to weave its way into their organizations.

"We've seen it about two times, and we proactively blocked it," says Waqas Akkawi, senior manager of IT security at SIRVA, the relocation-services firm which includes Allied Van Lines. Akkawi thinks the worm showed up from USB drives used by outside sales people coming in to make presentations. Akkawi says the equipment he uses called CounterAct from Forescout detected its attempt to spread , and the SIRVA IT staff quickly snuffed it out from a couple of PCs.

Network World


--------------------
Republican Values:

1) You can't get married to your spouse who is the same sex as you.
2) You can't have an abortion no matter how much you don't want a child.
3) You can't have a certain plant in your possession or you'll get locked up with a rapist and a murderer.

4) We need a smaller, less-intrusive government.

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InvisibleDiploidM
Cuban


Folding@home Statistics
Registered: 01/09/03
Posts: 19,274
Loc: Rabbit Hole
Re: Microsoft Offers $250,000 Reward for Virus Author [Re: Diploid]
    #9789673 - 02/13/09 09:12 AM (15 years, 1 month ago)

Here's a good description of how this thing works. It's very cleverly designed. Instead of trying to prosecute the author, Microsoft might do better by offering him a job. Whoever did this is obviously way out of Microsoft's league. :yesnod:

--

Friday, February 13, 2009 2:20 AM PST

There have been big computer worm outbreaks before, but nothing quite like Conficker.

First spotted in November, the worm had soon infected more computers than any worm in recent years. By some estimates it is now installed on more than 10 million PCs. But ever since its first appearance, it has been strangely quiet. Conficker infects PCs and spreads around networks, but it doesn't do anything else. It could be used to launch a massive cyberattack, crippling virtually any server on the Internet, or it could be leased out to spammers in order to pump out billions upon billions of spam messages. Instead, it sits there, a massive engine of destruction waiting for someone to turn the key.

Until recently, many security researchers simply didn't know what the Conficker network was waiting for. On Thursday, however, an international coalition revealed that they had taken unprecedented steps to keep the worm separate from the command-and-control servers that could control it. The group is comprised of security researchers, technology companies, domain name registrars who have joined forces with the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), which oversees the Internet's Domain Name System.

Researchers had taken apart Conficker's code and discovered that it uses a tricky new technique to phone home for new instructions. Each day, the worm generates a fresh list of about 250 random domain names such as aklkanpbq.info. It then checks those domains for new instructions, verifying their cryptographic signature to ensure that they were created by Conficker's author.

When Conficker's code was first cracked, security experts snatched up some of these randomly generated domains, creating what are known as sinkhole servers to receive data from hacked machines and observe how the worm worked. But as the infection became more widespread, they began registering all of the domains -- close to 2,000 per week -- taking them out of circulation before criminals had a chance to tell their infected computers what to do. If ever the bad guys tried to register one of these command-and-control domains, they would have found that they'd already been taken, by a fictional group calling itself the "Conficker Cabal." Its address? 1 Microsoft Way, Redmond Washington.

This is a new kind of cat-and-mouse game for researchers, but it has been tested a few times over the past few months. In November, for example, another group used the technique to take control of domains used by one of the world's largest botnet networks, known as Srizbi, cutting it off from its command-and-control servers.

With thousands of domains, however, this tactic can become time consuming and expensive. So with Conficker, the group has identified and locked up names using a new technique, called domain pre-registration and lock.

By dividing up the work of identifying and locking out Conficker's domains, the group has only kept the worm in check, not dealt it a fatal blow, said Andre DiMino, co-founder of The Shadowserver Foundation, a cybercrime watchdog group. "This is really the first key effort at this level that has the potential to make a substantial difference," he said. "We'd like to think we've had some effect in crippling it."

This is uncharted territory for ICANN, the group responsible for managing the Internet's address system. In the past, ICANN has been criticized for being slow to use its power to revoke accreditation from domain name registrars who have been widely used by criminals. But this time it's getting praise for relaxing rules that made it hard to lock down domains and for bringing together the group's participants.

"In this specific case they greased the wheels so that things would move quickly," said David Ulevitch, founder of OpenDNS. "I think they should be commended for that. ... It's one of the first times that ICANN has really done something positive."

The fact that such a diverse group of organizations are all working together is remarkable, said Rick Wesson, CEO of network security consultancy Support Intelligence. "That China and America cooperated to defeat a malicious activity on a global scale... that's serious. That's never happened," he said.

ICANN did not return calls seeking comment for this story and many of the participants in the Conficker effort, including Microsoft, Verisign and the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) declined to be interviewed for this article.

Privately, some participants say that they do not want to draw attention to their individual efforts to combat what may well be an organized cybercrime group. Other say that because the effort is so new, it is still premature to discuss tactics.

Whatever the full story, the stakes are clearly high. Conficker has already been spotted on government and military networks and has been particularly virulent within corporate networks. One slip-up, and Conficker's creators could reprogram their network, giving the computers a new algorithm that would have to be cracked and giving them an opportunity to use these computers for nefarious purposes. "We have to be 100 percent accurate," Wesson said. "And the battle is a daily battle."

PC World


--------------------
Republican Values:

1) You can't get married to your spouse who is the same sex as you.
2) You can't have an abortion no matter how much you don't want a child.
3) You can't have a certain plant in your possession or you'll get locked up with a rapist and a murderer.

4) We need a smaller, less-intrusive government.

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InvisibleBoom
just a tester
Male
Registered: 06/16/04
Posts: 11,252
Loc: Cypress Creek
Re: Microsoft Offers $250,000 Reward for Virus Author [Re: Diploid]
    #9791677 - 02/13/09 05:39 PM (15 years, 1 month ago)

Yeah this is an interesting story...lots of places have been disallowing USB media for months now, I suppose this is why.. :strokebeard:

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InvisibleAhronZombi
AhronZombi


Registered: 04/06/04
Posts: 1,265
Re: New Windows Virus Run Rampant - 8 Million Infections In Four Days [Re: Stonehenge]
    #9796524 - 02/14/09 04:14 PM (15 years, 1 month ago)

download and run windows 7 its better and free. or even better use linux

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Offlinemakaveli8x8
Stranger
Male User Gallery

Registered: 02/28/06
Posts: 21,636
Last seen: 7 years, 9 months
Re: New Windows Virus Run Rampant - 8 Million Infections In Four Days [Re: AhronZombi]
    #9806823 - 02/16/09 08:53 AM (15 years, 1 month ago)

so is E-Herpes part of the stimulus package?


--------------------
We were sent to hell for eternity :hellfire: Ø:omgawesome:h®
We play on earth to pass the time :foreheadslap:

Over-population the root of all Evil-brings the Elites Closer to the gates.

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