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Vol. 5, No. 33
8-18-05
As more information develops on the current virus outbreak (reported Tuesday evening in our special edition) it appears that there are two or three competing groups of hackers/virus writers creating multiple variants of both the Rbot and Zotob worms. Mikko Hypponen, antivirus research manager for F-Secure, describes it thus: “We seem to have a botwar on our hands,”
It would seem these different groups are racing to create the largest “bot net”, which is a collection of compromised PCs that can be hijacked remotely and used for nearly any purpose. The fact that nobody knows why these groups are doing this is a bit troubling.
A little more time to sort out exactly what has been happening also points out that, while the security flaw the worms exploit affects all newer versions of Windows, they seem to concentrating on 2000 Pro and 2000 Server machines only. XP and Server 2003 machines so far have been spared. This means the threat to home users was originally overstated. I apologize if Tuesday’s Virus Alert issue needlessly frightened any of you. Most of you are probably safe from the current outbreak, but be aware that the security flaw is there and if you don’t patch it the next variant could threaten your PC.
In these days of data and identity theft, infected zombie PCs and escalating spam you have to stay on top of Windows and AV program updates. The short time span between the release of the patch for this flaw (8-9-05) and the injection of the first exploit worm into the wild (8-13-05) illustrates the importance of applying the critical updates as soon as they become available.
There’s an obvious downside to this, which is why so many networks at major corporations were affected by this outbreak. Sometimes the patches break things. Often there are patches one month that need to be patched the following month. XP SP2 broke so many applications that nearly every technology writer suggested putting it off as long as possible, including me.
If you have to format your system and reload Windows from scratch to successfully install a patch it may be better to take your chances, or so many technology managers think. IT departments at large companies want to test each and every patch extensively before they inject it into their networks and they have good reason. If they get infected with something they may be down for a day or two but if a network wide update breaks some custom designed critical application they may be down for a month.
This is where Microsoft needs to get on the stick. When security researchers find a flaw in some Windows process they will generally report it to Microsoft immediately. Unfortunately MS often sits on these reports for months before making any attempts to fix the problem. If they stood to and started working on these problems right away they could do advanced releases of these patches to IT types for testing before public release (which might also push back the public release of information about the flaws).
As it is the researchers often get tired of waiting for a response from MS and will frequently opt to make their findings public to try forcing Microsoft’s hand.
I don’t necessarily agree with this tactic, especially in that it can occasionally result in prosecution of the researcher under some of our more draconian “cyber security” laws, but I understand why some of these security experts take this route. In my dictionary Microsoft is one of the definitions of frustration.
I had several items of interest that I wanted to talk about this week before this virus scare popped up so look for a potpourri of topics next week.
I do want to take the time to let you know the chat room is available once again through the PC Guru website (www.thepcgurus.com in case you missed all the other links ;)). Ed is still revamping it but the site is live with his new creative design and it looks great! Good job Ed!
This issue is a bit short this week due to the Tuesday edition. We should be back to full content next week. Also I’m adding a Table of Contents in the newsletter header, starting with this issue, at the request of our resident cartoonist Terry Wise. It will list the topics of each section at the beginning of each issue to help you navigate those archives of stored issues I’m sure you all have saved ;)
Stay safe…
Kevin Mefford, Editor
Terry Wise
Tech News of the Week
Have you ever
wondered what the inside of a Mac mini looks like?
Evidently you're not the
only one. The short answer: about $250 in
parts:
http://news.com.com/Dissecting+the+core+of+Apples+Mac+Mini/2100-1042_3-5837265.html?tag=nefd.top
$50
used iBooks. A crowd of thousands. More people than laptops.
What could possibly go wrong?
http://www.theregister.com/2005/08/18/ibook_rio_witness/
We've
heard about BPL (broadband over power lines) for several years
now.
While some companies are already experimenting with it, some
pundits are
saying that it's still a flash in the pan:
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/techinnovations/2005-08-14-power-line-broadband_x.htm
You
may already know that the US ranks 16th among the world's nations
in terms of
broadband internet access. But wait until you find out
what the FCC
considers "broadband":
http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news04/2005/broadband.html
Copy us on the good stuff ;-)
Matthew Dattilo
thepcgurus@gmail.com
www.opaquelucidity.com
Download of the Week
Last year I mentioned a program called Hi Net Recorder to capture streaming video. It’s a bit balky and difficult to configure and the interface is anything but intuitive but it does indeed capture video.
SDP on the other hand captures not only video but also audio, has an easy to understand interface, clearly labeled buttons and is a breeze to configure. It even functions like a VCR, allowing you to record timed streams such as radio broadcasts even if you aren’t home.
Coming from the PC Gurus you know it’s free. Grab it from http://sdp.ppona.com/ and never miss an Internet based broadcast again!
Email Question of the Week
Q: I got a Newsletter from C-Net telling
about the Backdoor.win32Dumador.df or SRV.SSAkeylogger virus. It gives you
a
download to block it on computer for Windows XP and 98. When it says
for
XP only does that mean XP SP 2 is included? I have Windows XP SP2,
use AVG
(paid version) and ZoneAlarm for a firewall. What should I
do?
A: Yes, the fix is for any version of XP
but it's only for cleaning
the malware out if you're infected. The
story behind this is pretty
interesting; I'm shocked I haven't heard of
it. Obviously I need to
expand my website reading
;)
Thanks for
the update and keep us posted...
Kevin Mefford
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