Bonum Certa Men Certa

Eye on Security: 'Fun' with Zombies, Press Ignorance, and Bizarre Solutions

"Our products just aren't engineered for security."

--Brian Valentine, Microsoft executive



Microsoft software is not exactly renowned for being secure, despite attempts to manipulate journalists. The software is notorious for being deficient or defective. To Microsoft, security and networking were an afterthought, not a design consideration, as shown here. Granted, trouble should be anticipated.



Zombies Conundrum



Stories about Windows zombies are a dime a dozen, just like zombie nodes. It is estimated that about 320 million Windows PCs are zombies. Here is the latest story on this never-ending (and very costly) battle.

Researchers at Trend reported that 500,000 unique hosts have been infected across the globe. Macalintal said that because of the behavior of the worm, he expected to see the botnet grow bigger and produce more variants.


That's small potatoes compared to the whole, but it just happens to be a new example. Not so long ago we witnessed hospitals and army bases becoming botnets, as well. It's a hugely serious subject that results in many untold deaths.

Insecure by Design



As prior links demonstrate (we strive to avoid repetition), it is agreed even by Microsoft's biggest of fans that Windows fails at security because it's just bad at it. It's nothing to do with market share and those lies are running thin. In the following new article, Microsoft's security model comes under fire.

When Microsoft released an emergency patch last month for a critical vulnerability in the server service in Windows, administrators and security teams in enterprises around the world scrambled to test the fix, schedule downtime and get the patch distributed as quickly as possible. If ever there was an occasion to use all due haste in deploying a patch, this was it. Not only was the vulnerability present in every supported version of Windows, but Microsoft officials had warned that it was a prime candidate for a worm.


Here is another one from the news.

Security Manager's Journal: When is a patch not really a patch?



[...]

If you don't reboot a Windows server after a patch is applied, the patch doesn't take effect, but SMS doesn't notice that failure to reboot. This insistence on rebooting is one of the things I dislike about Windows. In the Unix world, all that's usually required is that a particular process be restarted.


There has been lots of chatter about a flaw in Mozilla Firefox, but like many previous ones, this new vulnerability only applies to Windows, where Firefox inherits some risky behaviour which it sometimes attempts to mimic due to necessity. Why isn't the press covering this properly?

Bad, wicked Firefox, bad wicked open source...except that this trojan *only* works on Windows...which means it's bad wicked Windows, yet again. But the article never mentions this, of course.

[...]

And yes, you guessed it, it only works on Windows. So that bit about "[t]he most remarkable feature of the episode may not be the breach of security, but the cost of dealing with it" is really about the cost of using Windows - well, it's The Economist, what do you expect, accuracy? When will they ever learn?


As Glyn Moody shows, there are rare exceptions among the reporters.

The Web Vector



Adding to a mountain of reasons for infection:

1. Facebook hit by virus

"Koobface" that uses the social network's messaging system to infect PCs, then tries to gather sensitive information such as credit card numbers.


2. Most recent Windows infections result from the same simple trick

BitDefender's Top 10 E-Threats Report identifies just one type of attack as being responsible for more than a third of Windows infections in the past month: fake anti-virus scans, also known as scareware.


Attacking the Outcome, Not the Cause



Here is a good and short article titled "Punishment vs. Prevention."

Finally, I feel compelled to issue the warning, "Be careful what you wish for, because you might just get it." If the government takes over Internet security, there is sure to be a large amount of new regulation imposed. And this could mean security companies like F-Secure would have to devote a lot of resources towards compliance. I think it would be much better for us to take responsibility for finding solutions ourselves.


This is a hot topic at the moment because concerned authorities ponder tackling the zombies issues by making punishment for those caught a lot more severe. But it's totally the wrong way of addressing the issue. As Carla argues very rightly: ""Instead of Throwing Everyone In Jail, Fix Your Lousy Products"

Have any of them-- has one single vendor, whether it's Symantec or Trend or McAfee or F-Secure or anyone-- ever said "Quit throwing your money down a rathole-- stop using Windows, or at least don't put it on the Internet"? Wouldn't that little tidbit of honesty be refreshing? But no, they'll never do that. If the same conditions existed in, say, the small home appliances industry people would be getting electrocuted by their toasters and hair dryers every day, and the manufacturers would advise them to learn correct handling of live wires, and a thriving industry of insulated safety garments would prey on the survivors. If they made safety gear for swimmers it would be so bulky and uncomfortable they either wouldn't use it, or they would drown under the weight of it.

Following current trends, anyone who criticized them would be persecuted under the DMCA.


Instead of pointing a finger at those who produce and sell shoddy software, those who suffer are blamed for negligence and stricter rules are devised as means of punishment (false cure), not prevention. It won't work. The systems need to be changed, as opposed to just their side-effects.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Brett Wilson LLP Sent Over 5 Kilograms (or Over 12 Pounds) of Legal Papers! Because Writing About Microsoft Abuses is 'Illegal'.
How do you guys sleep at night? On a big pile of Microsoft money?
Extremism as a Weapon Against GNU/Linux (Microsoft Lunduke)
He ought to know the Halloween Documents. Wasn't he a Microsoft employee when these came out?
 
Gemini Links 09/07/2025: Extreme Testing and Golang Documentation in Geminispace
Links for the day
Vice President of the European Patent Office (EPO) Complains That Techrights Gives Visibility to Legal and Technical Issues at the EPO
"Follow-up on enquiries relating to Dir. 1218 and 1001"
Slopwatch: linuxsecurity.com and Various Slopfarms That Lie About "Linux" and Are Promoted by Google News
Google does not seem interested in tackling this problem
Links 09/07/2025: War Updates and Microsoft Moving to India to Cut Costs
Links for the day
GNU/Linux Was Always a 'Movement' of Inclusion of Tolerance
Even the licences themselves remove access barriers
Links 09/07/2025: "Subprime AI Crisis" and "OpenAI May Be in Major Trouble Financially"
Links for the day
Huge Piles of Legal Papers ('Paper DDoS') Do Not Impress Judges and Regulators
they just make judges and regulators even more suspicious of the eagerness to resort to 'paper DDoS'
Lunduke Isn't Even Hiding His Anti-Linux Agenda (From "Linux Sucks" to "Linux is Pedophiles")
just trying to make a lot of trouble
Some People Use Computers to Get Actual Work Done
Tolerance and inclusion must extend to acceptance that some people don't agree with you, might never agree with you, and imposing what allegedly works for you on them is unreasonable
Example of "Old" Things That Still Work
The notion that something being "old" implies it must be discarded is typically advanced by those looking to sell more of something
Some Scheduled Maintenance Later Today
Typically the most vulnerable service during short interruptions is IRC
Computers Are Just a Tool
People don't get married because they love weddings, folks don't join the army because they love war, and most drivers don't drive to work because they love cars
Apple Way Past Its Prime
Apple deserves a decline
The FSF's SysOps Team Recovered From Serious Hardware Issue Within Hours
About half a day ago I noticed that all/most GNU/FSF sites were not reachable and thus reached out to a contact for any details
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, July 08, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, July 08, 2025
Slopwatch: Turning Bugs Into FUD About "Linux", Getting Basic Facts Wrong
all the screenshots are of fake articles; we don't want to link to any
Technical Reasons, Not Politics: With Wayland "it feels a lot like Linux from 20-25 years ago, which is horrendously frustrating, because it feels like we wasted one or two decades of progress and stability"
Lately, quite a few benchmarks were published to show Wayland compares poorly compared to what we had
PCLinuxOS Recovering From Fire
It looks like a nightmare scenario, where even backups onsite get destroyed
Links 09/07/2025: More Heatwaves, Officials Culled in Russia
Links for the day
Gemini Links 09/07/2025: XScreensaver and Resurrection
Links for the day
Links 08/07/2025: "Cyberattack Deals Blow to Russian Firmware" and "Cash Remains King"
Links for the day
FSF40 T-shirt message
by Alex Oliva
Gemini Links 08/07/2025: Creativity, Gotify with NUT Server, and Sudo Bugs
Links for the day
More on "Lunduke is Actually Sending His Audience to Attack People"
"pepe the frogs"
Links 08/07/2025: Sabotage of Networking Infrastructure, Microsoft XBox Game Pass Deemed “Unsustainable”
Links for the day
Dalai Lama Succession as Evidence That Determined, Motivated People Can Reach Their Nineties
And we need to quit talking about their death all the time
Many Lawyers (for Microsoft) and 1,316 Pages to Pick on a Litigant in Person Who Exposed Serious Microsoft Abuses
Answers must be given
Gemini Links 08/07/2025: Ancillary Justice and Small Web July
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, July 07, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, July 07, 2025
Layoffs and Shutdowns at IBM, Not Just Microsoft
Same as Microsoft
The FSF's (Free Software Foundation, Inc.) 2025 Summer Fundraiser Already Past Halfway Line
This is where GNU/Linux actually started
With Workers Back From a Holiday Weekend, Microsoft Layoffs Carry on, More Waves to Come
Now it's Monday and people are bad to work, even some journalists
Mozilla Had No Good Reason to Outsource Firefox Development to Microsoft
What does Mozilla plan to do when GitHub shuts down?
Mozilla Firefox Did Not Die, It Got Killed
To me it'll always look like Mozilla got killed by its sponsors, especially Google, which had a conflict of interest as a sponsor
You Need Not Wave a Rainbow Flag This Month to Basically Oppose Arseholes Looking to Disrupt and Divide the Community
Don't fall for it
Dan Neidle, Whom Brett Wilson LLP SLAPPed (on Behalf of Corrupt Rich Tax Evaders), Still Fighting the Good Fight
Neidle fights for the poor people
What Miguel de Icaza and Microsoft Lunduke Have in Common
Similar aims, different methods
Wayland Should Start by Dumping Its Very Ugly Logo
Wayland wins the "ugliest logo" award every year
Stop Focusing on Hair Colours, Focus on Corporate Agenda
If someone commits a crime, it does not matter if his or her hair was mostly white or there was no hair or a wig or whatever
Links 07/07/2025: Science, Conflicts, and a Fictional K-pop Group
Links for the day
Gemini Links 07/07/2025: Being a Luddite and Announcement of Gotify
Links for the day
Links 07/07/2025: XBox Effectively 'Dead', DMCA Subpoena Versus Registrar
Links for the day
The 'Corporate Neckbeard' is Not the "Good Guy"
Works for IBM
The Nasty Smear (and Stereotype) of "Neckbeard" or "Greybeard" is Ageism
This is the sort of stuff they might try to volley at critics of Wayland
Why Many of Us Use X Server and Will Continue to Use It For Many Years to Come
Don't make this about politics
Microsoft's Nat Friedman Became Unemployed the Same Time the SLAPPs Against Techrights Started Coming From His Friends (Weeks After We Had Exposed Scandals About Him and the Serial Strangler, His Best Friend, Who Got Arrested a Few Days Later)
Nat Friedman is not "Investor, entrepreneur"
Brett Wilson LLP Uses Threats to Demand Changes to Pages or Removal of Pages Without Even Revealing Which Staff Member Does That (Sometimes People From Another Firm!)
This has been in the public for years
Dan Neidle Said "It Really Then Became a Job of Tormenting" Lawyers Like Brett Wilson LLP (Who Threatened Him for Exposing Crimes, Just Like They Threatened My Wife a Few Months Later)
he and his wife decided to take on the evil people and their evil lawyers
Large Language Models (LLMs) Externalise Their Cost to the Free Software Foundation (FSF)
"The forty-sixth Free Software Bulletin is now available online!"
Weeding Out Extremism in Our Community
To me it seems like Microsoft Lunduke is rapidly becoming like a "hate preacher" who operates online, breeding an extremist ideology or trying to soften its image
Censorship Versus Fact-Checking and Quality Control
It's not censorship but a matter of quality control
Reinforcing the Allegations Some More, Bryan Lunduke Digs His Own Grave
In his latest episodes he merely repeats his own lies, which I debunked using evidence right from his own mouth
Global Warming and Free Software as a Force of Mitigation
we'll need to think about Software Freedom, not just brands like "Linux"
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, July 06, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, July 06, 2025
Gemini Links 07/07/2025: BaseLibre Numerical System and TUI Rant
Links for the day