Computer Viruses Broke 100,000 In 2004 214
Sammy at Palm Addict writes "The count of known computer viruses broke the 100,000 barrier in 2004 and the number of new viruses grew by more than 50% according to news from the BBC. The BBC also reports that 'phishing attempts, in which conmen try to trick people into handing over confidential data, are recording growth rates of more than 30% with attacks are becoming increasingly sophisticated.'"
microsoft's famous quote (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:Could we have a distinction here? (Score:2, Interesting)
Try to compare apples to apples...
Divide the # of viruses by the user base of the affected platform, see who is ahead at that point. I have no idea, my guess is it's probably fairly even, probably just a little slanted in favor of Linux.
complacency (Score:4, Interesting)
One of my buddies got his credit identity stolen a few months ago, he figures, by someone at a store who processed his credit application when he bought a home theatre system (Zero interest! Don't pay til way later!).
By the time collection agencies were knocking at his door, that store had closed.
what viruses? where? (Score:4, Interesting)
Until, that is, I open an MS Office document with macros, then the whole sense of dread and ire comes back; and I'm always surprised and annoyed when the latest worm brings local networks staggering to their knees.
I don't really care about viruses... (Score:4, Interesting)
I think all software should come with a self-signed key. By default it should allow upgrades by the same key (version 1.0->version 1.1), but not let other programs update eachother (e.g. explorer hooks, IE hooks, grab default applications, overwrite system libraries etc.)
I'm talking about all optional here, not DRM. I would love to have it such that I could install apache on my linux box, and not have it overwritten by anyone but apache (without my explicit permission) as well. Right now, once you have root, it is enough. But proper rights should be "need-to-have". Give a program permission to install itself, but don't fuck the rest of the system? Today, that can't be done.
Kjella
It's time Windows included a basic anti-virus tool (Score:3, Interesting)
What continues to blow my mind are the numbers of users who do not have anti-virus software installed or kept up to date on their systems. I really wish that Microsoft would include some basic type of anti-virus / anti-spyware utility with the operating system.
Yes, there would probably be a huge outcry about antitrust violations, but I believe the bottom line is that Microsoft has a duty to ship an operating system that is as reasonably secure as possible without including so many features as to push other vendors out of the market. I think the firewall in Windows XP SP2 is a good example of a compromise. The firewall includes enough basic features so that users aren't completely hanging out there in the wind, yet does not provide such a robust feature set so as to push third party firewall vendors out of the market. The disk defragmentation utility is another good example of a compromise. It has enough basic features to be useable, but not enough so as to push third party vendors out of the market.
Microsoft could do it if they wanted to, even if there was an outcry from vendors. Look at what they did with I.E. when they decided they wanted a piece of the browser market. For a more modern, post anti-trust trial example, look at what they are doing now with Windows Media Player. Yeah, the EU is calling them on it, but I think a real case could be made that a basic anti-virus / anti-spyware utility is as important a part of basic system security as a firewall.
Of course, if Microsoft just fixed I.E. and Outlook / Outlook Express, viruses and spyware wouldn't be as much of an issue, but we all know about how likely that is to happen.
Re:Could we have a distinction here? (Score:3, Interesting)
Viruses don't need to do anything tricky to propagate, they're just programs that people run. If I want to make a virus, why the hell would I do X amount of work to make it run on Linux when I could expend the same amount of effort to make it run on Windows? Just by switching I can increase my target base by a huge amount.
Exploits are different, they are based on actual software errors that shouldn't be. Exploits are solely the result of poor programming / design, and I agree that they are not in any way related to market share.
The article doesn't differentiate anything, but I would add: Worms are another matter, since they are viral exploits... that's where there's a real grey area, as you could legitimately classify them under either type.
Re:Could we have a distinction here? (Score:5, Interesting)
Try to compare apples to apples...
Divide the # of viruses by the user base of the affected platform, see who is ahead at that point. I have no idea, my guess is it's probably fairly even, probably just a little slanted in favor of Linux.
Last I heard, there were something like 100 known Linux viruses, and 20 known Mac OS X viruses. Assume the current desktop market share is 3-5% each for Linux and Mac, and Windows still comes out "ahead" by quite a large margin. On the server side, of course, things look even worse for Windows.
Re:Could we have a distinction here? (Score:3, Interesting)
The first link even links to an old