LET'S give some credit to Microsoft. It's a very comical company. One of its satirists, Mr. Charney, has been making many good people laugh when he started preaching about help to Microsoft through taxpayers' money. It began several months ago [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9] and earlier this month he took the stage again [1, 2], telling a sob story and then appealing for donations. His employer created a monster with a back door and it cannot seem to get this monster under control anymore (it only keeps getting worse).
Let me run that past you again: if your computer (or network) gets infected by some malware and ends up being part of a botnet, quite possibly courtesy of some zero-day exploit taking advantage of a Windows vulnerability, then that computer (or network) should be forcibly disconnected and put into some kind of cyber-quarantine using an adapted public health model.
Charney clearly hasn’t thought this through. In his speech at the International Security Solutions Europe (ISSE) Conference in Berlin, and also in the accompanying Microsoft white paper “Collective Defense: Applying Public Health Models to the Internet” he pushes the whole public health model approach as a solution to the online security threat. Charney likens an infected computer to an infected individual who puts others at risk by not getting vaccinated, and argues that a public health model which tracks and controls the spread of infection, quarantining folk to reduce the spread, is the answer in the IT world.
One of the benefits of being an 800-pound gorilla in this world is that you can use your strength and influence to help others.
So, apparently, seems to be the altruistic thinking at Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) these days. Not content to rule the world -- or at least try to -- with its Windows desktop dominance, the software behemoth has now apparently paused to propose a way to tackle the Internet's malware problems too.
In a statement released Wednesday, executives for the Boeing Co. and Microsoft Corp. say I-1098 would harm businesses by raising costs for suppliers and making it harder to attract talent.
U.S. officials have charged 92 suspects believed to have been involved in cyber attacks that stole $70 million from bank accounts over the last four years. Meanwhile, authorities in London arrested 19 people who allegedly stole more than $9 million in just over three months using the same malware. Police in the Ukraine arrested five suspects on September 30.
But will 116 arrests make a dent into the international banking fraud being perpetrated via Zeus? Don't get your hopes up, say industry experts.
Comments
kozmcrae
2010-10-12 12:18:23
Our immune systems have the benefit of millions of years of adaptation. We are under attack, literally, every second. If our immune systems were as faulty as Microsoft's operating systems, one third the population of the Earth would be on their death beds.
Dr. Roy Schestowitz
2010-10-12 12:33:39
The Irish suffered massive famine because they once believed in one form of agri-monoculture with potatoes.