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Looking Back At the Other Kind of Virus
Posted by
timothy
on Sun May 03, 2009 05:34 PM
from the shouldn't-this-be-a-list-of-13? dept.
from the shouldn't-this-be-a-list-of-13? dept.
Slatterz writes "All this panic over a strain of flu got these people thinking about some of the more virulent computer pandemics that have hit in recent years. While a computer virus pales in seriousness to a human outbreak, malware attacks can still take a huge toll on businesses throughout the world. This list of the top ten worst viruses includes some interesting trivia, including ARPANET's Creeper virus in 1971, how early attempts at copy protection resulted in Brain, and MyDoom's denial of service attack on SCO."
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Submission: Top ten worst viruses by Anonymous Coward
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the manual virus (Score:3, Funny)
this talk about virii reminds me of a a mail I got once...
this is the manual virus, based on the code of honour.
for every of your disk drive
for every folder
delete contents
type the following, in capitals: you've been owned :)
Re:the manual virus (Score:5, Informative)
For the zillionth time, in Latin times, no one had the kind of technology to be able to see viruses, so no one knew they were individual things. The word 'virus' thus refered to a liquid, like an infected substance, and therefore was measured in unitS of quanitY (eg, 2 gallons of petrol, or 4 glasses of apple juice), not unit quantities (eg 4 individual apples). Notice where pluralisation occurs. To suggest Latin rules for pluralisation is absurd because the latin word wasn't to be pluralised; the units of measurement were to be. Learned folk should not repeat this mistake.
(I'm sure those with greater knowledge of Latin could weigh in on other reasons why 'virii' is incorrect, this is just the one I've been made aware of)
Parent
Re:the manual virus (Score:4, Insightful)
The single biggest rule I use is. "Which language am I speaking?".
If the answer is English, then who cares from which language the word originated, and how that language may or may not have pluralised it?
In English, we append '-s' or '-es', so if in doubt, do that.
Doing so may not be correct all the time, but at least when it's wrong it looks like a simple mistake, rather than pretentious hyper-correction.
Parent
In English, we append -s or -es (Score:2)
Re:the manual virus (Score:4, Insightful)
A. Virii is cooler.
B. The ancient attempt to force Latin grammar rules on English needs to be done away with. Split infinitives and ending sentences in prepositions may be crimes in Latin but are perfectly fine in English.
And some people need to stop being latin-grammar nazis.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Split infinitives and ending sentences in prepositions may be crimes in Latin but are perfectly fine in English.
"This is the sort of English up with which I will not put"
Thing of the past? (Score:5, Interesting)
Is the old floppy-to-floppy style of virus nearing extinction, or will poisoned bittorrent files breathe new life into this kind of chicanery?
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I sure hope so. the old virus', despite being malicious and stupid, were at least a little bit amusing at times. Remember the virus' that didn't actually do any permanent damage, just did something annoying for a couple of hours before they self-deleted? Those were the days.
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Get your accurate memory of how things were out of my nostalgia dammit. I only miss the cute ones, not the pointlessly destructive crap. Besides, the best written ones were never that droll... only a newb would ever think that killing random file systems just to be a jerk is kewl.
Re:Thing of the past? (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:Thing of the past? (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
I don't think much has changed myself. Viruses still rely on peoples willingness to share and do the stupid. These days the only difference is that things have modernised, we've replaced the floppy with any device having storage space on it. Be those memory sticks, cell phones, digital cameras, MP3/4 players, external hard drives, and so on. This is where the spread is happening. In a large way we can thank Microsoft for their default auto run feature here.
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I think it's because people are using CDs and DVDs to do things like boot disks (and often to move data around) these days.
As flash based technology displaces read-only optical, I think you'll see a resurgence in old style sneakernet viruses.
Slashdotted (Score:4, Informative)
Slashdotted, get the Coral cached version: http://www.pcauthority.com.au.nyud.net/News/143993,top-ten-worst-viruses.aspx [nyud.net]
At last! (Score:5, Insightful)
At last, an article from a major outlet that doesn't break up into ten seperate pages, one for each item, all in hopes of getting more page/ad views. :)
Re:At last! (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Re:At last! (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Little big difference (Score:2)
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Incomplete article? (Score:2, Insightful)
Anywho, these viruses remind me of a kinder, gentler time when lemonade was real and the danger wasn't, when we had to boot our machines up hill, both ways in the snow, and yada yada yada. Good piece of nostalgia, but I'd be interested to see #2 and #1.
Re:Incomplete article? (Score:5, Funny)
They're waiting for slashdot readers to enumerate the last two. They'll read all the "They forgot xxx virus" comments and by tomorrow, they'll wrap up #2 and #1.
Parent
Re:Incomplete article? (Score:5, Funny)
Top ten incomplete top ten lists:
10) That virus one [pcauthority.com.au]
9) This one
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
after #3. MyDoom, there's no jump, no next page, just the copy right notice, am i missing something?
On #2 there is a virus so secretive, that any mention of it's name deletes the entire paragraph on any webpage.
On #1 thWHERE paragraphId=254369;
code red (Score:5, Interesting)
Code Red wreaked havoc on the routers at the place I was working for back in 2001. That was the virus that caused ISP's to block the ports for all those peronal web servers running for no reason. Well the ISP's relised that they could cut thier traffic in half by leaving the ports blocked permanently. The virus allowed an infected machine to receive remote commands via IE cgi commands. You could check the router log to see who was infected, connect to the IP with IE and read and write to thier hard drive. The virus was named by the security team that found it, they were drinking Mountain Dew Code Red at the time.
Re:code red (Score:4, Interesting)
Parent
STDs (Score:5, Funny)
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The Real Worry (Score:5, Funny)
The real worry is that a computer virus will make the leap into the human population.
Re:The Real Worry (Score:4, Insightful)
The real worry is that a computer virus will make the leap into the human population.
Well they already use humans as a medium of transmission.
Parent
Re:The Real Worry (Score:5, Funny)
I believe this has already happened.
A large number people were exposed for far too long to a popular operating system (name undisclosed) and this has infected their brain resulting in a massive dumbing down of the users... A few antivirus are available but the problem is that while the virus is in control, the subjects will refuse to take any cure.
Parent
Re:The Real Worry (Score:5, Funny)
Ah yes. Parent is referring to the viral nature of the GPL. If I learned anything in school, it's that using Linux is like having unprotected sex with Richard Stallman.
-BSD fanboi
[Mods, relax. It's a joke. I know the parent would want me to say it's about Windows and Bill Gates, which makes me wonder about those poor chaps who go both ways and dual boot. I bet they take it in the boot... Oh bugger I did it again, sorry!]
Parent
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Nimda deserved its place (Score:4, Interesting)
The first I heard about nimda was one of the senior engineers in our company telling me to scan my PC and let him know if anything showed up. The only thing that did was a java script trojan dropper which was relatively harmless, but by the time I'd finished everyone was sitting around waiting for the company network to be given the all clear.
Nimda seemed to show a preference for hitting file servers. Even though my machine was clear at the start, I was just checking through a shared folder and *bam*, as soon as the mouse moved across a file called readme.txt.js (The final extension was hidden, but this didn't make any difference.) a tftp connection was opened to the host, and fortunately the antivirus had been updated by that time, and so stopped it. The preview bug that caused this was a zero day.
I was on a win98 box at the time, some people on unpatched NT machines fared worse (Yeah yeah, I know patch or die.. but the company I was at didn't take endpoint security seriously, it was a wake up call to the IT department, this was the first and last worm to really own our network.) they got hit by the worm like behaviour, from directory traversal attacks with no assistance from the user needed. Nimda shut us down for days, during the first few all clears our antivirus provider was still learning all the attack vectors, so it kept coming back.
I'd like to throw a few bricks at Symantec over this, but it was a shocking learning experience for more than just them. I doubt another event like this will happen on well managed networks.. It will just be the odd trojan leaking information and joining a botnet. Or maybe some idiot connecting his personal modem behind the firewall, but I can only hope not.
Short memories (Score:3, Funny)
I get the strange impression that the authors aren't terribly clear on the difference between an Apple II and a modern Mac.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
What's there to be clear about? The Apple II and the modern Mac are both crap. :-)
Is that all?
Look, this is no place for amateur trolls.
For example, if you're going to say something about Macs you should at least learn the basics: express doubts about the user's sexual orientation, imply lower intelect due to the fact they're paying a higher price, compare Mac users to a cult etc.
This trolling of yours is shite.
I question your paternity.
Anyone remember the Howard Stern virus? (Score:2)
Top 12 through 3 viruses? (Score:2)
Where the hell are #2 and #1?
Depends (Score:3, Insightful)
Well, virus is not really the proper word for most of what is infecting people anymore. It's malware, spyware, and trojans.
However, you design a destructive virus to hit public infrastructures and medical facilities and it might as serious or more than a biological virus.
Re: (Score:2)
People get infected with viruses, or worms, but not malware. Computers get infected with malware, spyware and trojans.
Man, you've gotta get out more often.
xkcd, anyone? (Score:3, Funny)
I'll nominate a few (Score:3, Interesting)
1) Michelangelo
Back in the MS-DOS days this virus caused a scare at my workplace, on Michelangelo's birthday we were given directive to shut down our computers...my first experience with Virus hype...
2) Good Times Virus
Well ok not a virus, but I remember having to explain to my dad what a Virus hoax was for hours...ugggh...
Subscription ? (Score:2)
Do we have to subscribe somewhere to find out what #2 and #1 are ?
How about a top 10 list of websites who are hopeless at compiling top 10 lists.
Honourable Mention - Underpants Gnomes
#10 PCAuthority
#2 ???
#1 Profit !!!
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Re: (Score:2, Funny)
I bet that there's something in klingon or lojban to embody the nerd's mating call...
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
There's no mention of the Blaster/Sasser worm [wikipedia.org], Sircam [f-secure.com], CIH [wikipedia.org] or Magistr [f-secure.com]. All of which caused panic and damage at least on the same scale as Conficker. All of which had much more damaging payloads than any of those noted.
Seems to be a fairly dodgy, or poorly researched list.
Re: (Score:2)
Worst virus I've ever seen. Completely unrepairable. Had to wipe his system twice. Nobody has a cleaner or disinfectant utility. The saving grace, I guess, is that it's so virulent it destroys the system before it can spread much.
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Top Ten Medical Breakthroughs Of All Time:
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Only in slashdot-land does a first post get modded as "Redundant"
Honest question: how many other places can someone be modded redundant for anything? I don't browse a lot of forums, but it doesn't seem too common.
Re: (Score:2)
As an example, a post that says nothing but, "Hey, guys, a list of the top ten viruses!" would be redundant, even if nobody else posted anything like it.