via SecurityFocus: On Tuesday night, Google accidentally sent out three posts on the official mailing list that contained copies of the Kapser.A worm, also known as the mass-mailing computer Kama Sutra. The video team pulled the posts from the archive on Wednesday, but not before 50,000 subscribers received the message, according to a PC World report. Come on, Google. What about your corporate motto, “Don’t be evil“? Oh well, a little joke at Google’s expense. That said, isn’t it about time that 100% of news and mailing list servers scan 100% of messages posted?
Year: 2006
I’m surprised this doesn’t happen more often on sites like Wikipedia, or if it does we don’t hear about it. The page hijacked by the virus creators was about a new variant of the Windows Blaster worm. Included on the page was a link to a supposed patch that, once downloaded and installed, would protect against this new version. However, anyone installing this on a Windows machine would infect themselves with a virus. The malicious hackers behind the fake article then sent out a German-language spam e-mail with a message crafted to look like it came from Wikipedia. The message directed people to the booby-trapped page and the fake fix. By piggy-backing on the good name of Wikipedia the message[…]
Well…not quite.
Now this is “thinking ahead” about security. Let’s see if the technology makes it though (personally I have high hopes). Worrying about malicious software may be premature for a technology so young. The first digital electronic computer, ENIAC, went online in 1946 and the first known attacks against computer systems occurred about two decades later. Yet, in all likelihood, such attacks will become a reality, and that’s reason enough to worry now, said USC’s Lidar. There is no telling what such an attack might look like. Destroying data or circumventing a calculation on a quantum computer is the easiest course. Attackers could operate a rogue computer on the quantum network or corrupt the communications line, he said. Because some of[…]
What this article points out is a situation that every branch of security faces. That is that every incident such as this one is yet another reminder that every attack has potential. Although the article doesn’t state how the attackers were able to compromise the laptop, I’m willing to bet they exploited some well known vulnerability or somebody was checking their email and clicking on questionable links. I seriously doubt it was just because the attacker was “pretty good.” Granted he or she is probably “pretty good” – lucky for us in the States that they didn’t realize (or care) that they could have potentially disrupted water service for a bunch of people. So the article goes on as they[…]
I’ve heard of minimum password length requirements, but this is ridiculous…