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When Does it Become Appropriate to Take Windows off the Information Highway?

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Summary: Today's news about Conficker and its effects on those sharing the road and paying the toll

MY REGULARLY-ALLOCATED DNS server was hardly reachable for several hours this morning (again). Only later did I discovered a possible cause, which may agree with last week's multitude of reports about DNS and DDOS attacks:

Conficker begins stealthy update

The Conficker worm has started to update infected machines with a mystery package of data.

Computer security firms watching the malicious program noticed that it sprang into life late on 8 April.


Conficker wakes up, updates via P2P, drops payload

Mafiaboy: Conficker Was a Ruse

According to Calce, you need to look no further than the Conficker worm, and the worry generated by its expected activation last week, to see why things haven't changed much since 2000.


Conficker botnet stirs to distribute update payload

More news on the effect of Windows malware:

New e-crime units nabs nine banking Trojan suspects

Investigators reckon the group of UK-based eastern European nationals used malware planted on compromised machines to steal login credentials and plunder online banking accounts.


Will this ever end? Or will it end the Internet as we know it?

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