Fake Word 2004 demo file causes irradication of a mac's Hom...

[ClimbingTheLog]

Your Dictionary at http://www.yourdictionary.com/

defines steal as: To take (the property of another) without right or permission.

That's not quite right. Here are some terms from a slightly less inaccurate dictionary:

Stealing: To take and carry away, feloniously; to take without right or leave, and with intent to keep wrongfully; as, to steal the personal goods of another.

So it's not stealing, as nothing is taken and carried away. The original remains so nothing is taken away.

Larceny: The unlawful taking and carrying away of things personal with intent to deprive the right owner of the same;

It's not larceny since we're not depriving the owner of the item (the item is not profit, it's the file in question).

Theft: To constitute theft there must be a taking without the owner's consent, and it must be unlawful or felonious; every part of the property stolen must be removed, however slightly, from its former position; and it must be, at least momentarily, in the complete possession of the thief.

It's not theft since the item is not removed and is never in complete possession of the thief.

Robbery: Robbery differs from theft, as it is effected by force or intimidation, whereas theft is committed by stealth, or privately.

Absolutely it's not robbery.

Piracy: Robbery on the high seas.

You'd have to mug somebody for their copy of OSX on a cruise ship for it to be piracy.

So, what is it then? It's copyright violation. That's a crime. It's on the books. It's wrong. It's what it is. There's no need to dramatize the action unless you have an agenda.

 

[ClimbingTheLog]

"Schadenfreude" is what these people experience. It's a German term meaning "pleasure at someone else's pain/loss."

There's an English term too, "sadism". Just since we're all speaking English in this gedanken experiment.

 

[MacBandit]

I will agree that it technically not stealing...very good points made. But there is no way in the world you can say that every (or even most) of piraters out there (as the majority are businesses statictically) would not have purchased the software if they had not recieved (notice I didn't say steal ) it free! Most of them would have purchased it and that does result in a direct loss of income *(potential at least). There are many that would pirate Word and if they couldn't they would use a free one or some sharware program, but many if not most would go ahead and buy it. Music is another story altogether in that many would not have purchases the music, but then again businesses are not in the music pirating business- for the most part.

I think it's quite the opposite. Most of the piraters have no money at all and that's why they pirate not because it's saving them money.

 

[idkew]

I think it's quite the opposite. Most of the piraters have no money at all and that's why they pirate not because it's saving them money.

i would disagree.


few people pirate a program they would use to make their income from.

you may fond some freelancers with pirated software, but the majority of designers use legal software.

 

[MacBandit]

i would disagree.


few people pirate a program they would use to make their income from.

you may fond some freelancers with pirated software, but the majority of designers use legal software.

I agree with that but you are talking about people that have money or make their living with an application. I am referring to the high school kid or the college kid who has no intention of making a living with a product but wants to play with it. Those are the typical piraters. I use to be one of them until I got a job and started making money. Then I realized how wrong it was and started buying programs that I was using and throwing out ones that I didn't own.

 

[idkew]

I am referring to the high school kid or the college kid who has no intention of making a living with a product but wants to play with it. Those are the typical piraters. .

but aren't those the kids who will be making a living off these programs when they graduate?

 

[Aithir]

There's an English term too, "sadism". Just since we're all speaking English in this gedanken experiment.

"sadism" is a Greek word, to be a little more accurate.

I wonder what all those guys who are now so happy with this man's misfortune would have said if the malicious piece of software was not mascqarated as a MS Word Web Installer, but as a Freeware ScreenSaver with amazing graphics or as a Freeware application of some kind.

 

[cb911]

hey, i'm a college kid, yeah, we need to get the apps to make sure that we actually have the skills to even get a job when we graduate. but i'd never think of still using pirated apps to earn money off. there have also been some massive fines in the past for companies that have been using pirated apps.

the majority of companies do use legit software, but i know that in the design world there are many different sort of pirated apps out there.

heh. we shoud be feeling special since we're starting to get trojans and the rest for OS X.

 

[Flowbee]

"sadism" is a Greek word, to be a little more accurate.

Regardless of its origin, 'sadism' is an English word (though its meaning is quite different than Schadenfreude).

And I believe the word sadism is actually French in origin, derived from the name of its most famous practitioner... the Marquis de SADE.

 

[MacBandit]

but aren't those the kids who will be making a living off these programs when they graduate?

No most I knew were like me at the time just wanting to play. It had nothing to do wither their or my career.

 

[idkew]

No most I knew were like me at the time just wanting to play. It had nothing to do wither their or my career.

so- in other words. if they didn't pirate the software, they never would have bought it?

sounds like no one is losing money here.

 

[Lz0]

The bit I like

"and to my delight the Microsoft icon looked genuine and trustworthy"

Since when did a M$ icon ever look genuine or trustworthy.

 

[mlrproducts]

so why is this a "trojan" again?

i thought this was just an applescript? that makes it a trojan? it doesn't phone home or open up any ports, just deletes stuff? sounds like spoof programs that "appeared to delete" things on Windows back in the day that we all emailed to each other.

This is like writing a program called "Delete.exe" which has a purpose to delete a hard drive. So if someone renames it to "firewall.exe" and passes it to someone who deletes their hard drive (fulfilling the purpose of the program), then it becomes a trojan? If so, then any piece of software not written by Microsoft qualifies as a trojan!

 

[rendezvouscp]

i thought this was just an applescript? that makes it a trojan? it doesn't phone home or open up any ports, just deletes stuff? sounds like spoof programs that "appeared to delete" things on Windows back in the day that we all emailed to each other.

This is like writing a program called "Delete.exe" which has a purpose to delete a hard drive. So if someone renames it to "firewall.exe" and passes it to someone who deletes their hard drive (fulfilling the purpose of the program), then it becomes a trojan? If so, then any piece of software not written by Microsoft qualifies as a trojan!

Boy (or girl), would Microsoft love that logic . Although it is somewhat true, but wouldn't Microsoft programs be included?
–Chase

 

[Santaduck]

If Rotoblade is correct, and this is just an applescript with the MS Word icon, can it really be considered a "Virus" ?
If it truly can be called a virus, than I just have one thought:
"Hell, I could have done THAT! I could have gone down in OSX history as the first virus writer for OSX..."

lol yeah all it would take is one "do shell script" line with a unix "rm" command to the home dir... I suppose the victim can just create a new user, and be relatively unscathed (as opposed to an applescript running sudo commands for the user silly enough to enter their password)...

anyways this is not really a "virus" in that it doesn't self-propagate, but sheesh slap on an icon and you've fooled 99% of the folks out there. I guess it's a Trojan tie-in with the movie release of Troy. =p

Other than the aforementioned file size (hello) and delete custom icon in Get Info (good idea), if you know how to look at Creator Types, MS word should be associated with "MSWD" rather than the applescript "aplt" (applet) or "dplt" (droplet).



PS *eradication

 

[mcnaught6]

MS Office 2004 in Bit Torrent....

there is a 650MB version of MS Office 2004 available for pirating through Bit Torrent.
not that i'm letting people know so they can get it for themselves, but to make aware that it probably isn't real. but it isn't the 100KB applescript from Limewire either.

 

[MacBandit]

i thought this was just an applescript? that makes it a trojan? it doesn't phone home or open up any ports, just deletes stuff? sounds like spoof programs that "appeared to delete" things on Windows back in the day that we all emailed to each other.

This is like writing a program called "Delete.exe" which has a purpose to delete a hard drive. So if someone renames it to "firewall.exe" and passes it to someone who deletes their hard drive (fulfilling the purpose of the program), then it becomes a trojan? If so, then any piece of software not written by Microsoft qualifies as a trojan!

A Trojan is just that. Just like the Trojan horse it may look like a gift on the outside but it's dastardly purpose is hidden inside.

 

[flyfish29]

I think it's quite the opposite. Most of the piraters have no money at all and that's why they pirate not because it's saving them money.

Studies have been done (I can't find them online right now- read several last year) and they said the same thing: most software pirating is done by businesses who buy one license and install on multiple computers. Obviously that is changing some recently with the internet becoming such an easy way to transfer software.

 

[MacBandit]

Studies have been done (I can't find them online right now- read several last year) and they said the same thing: most software pirating is done by businesses who buy one license and install on multiple computers. Obviously that is changing some recently with the internet becoming such an easy way to transfer software.

Yeah I can see that though this type of piracy isn't as nearly hyped by the anti-piracy crowd as the poor starving college student type piracy is.

 

[coolbreeze]

there is a 650MB version of MS Office 2004 available for pirating through Bit Torrent.
not that i'm letting people know so they can get it for themselves, but to make aware that it probably isn't real. but it isn't the 100KB applescript from Limewire either.

That's the most discreet advertisement I've ever seen...haha

 

[MrNolan]

Is this a Mac virus is Word?

Hi.

I'm running Word 2001 sr1 on an iBook with OS9.2.

Occassionally, especially when multiple Word documents are open, the program will freeze. The only option is either to force quit or restart the machine. In either instance, Word offers to rescue the crashed document - this is essential otherwise the work is lost completely.

The resulting document increases in size, now containing several pages of listing that look like this:

Sue McCauley
Sue McCauley
Kelly Mc Erlean
Kelly Mc Erlean
Webhosts International
Training Unit
Training Dept
Webhosts International
Training Unit
Training Dept
Dave Mc Ginn Reception
Dave Mc Ginn Reception
Informatique
Informatique
Service Informatique
ktipton
Service Informatique
ktipton
Laura Della Corte
Laura Della Corte
Loria Bianchi
Pr RICHARD
Loria Bianchi
Pr RICHARD
[q\;S—y¨Ö—y'Yf[›OeP;Sf[
Ì____________Rolf Apweiler swissprot
Rolf Apweiler swissprot
Claire O'Donovan
Claire O'Donovan
apweiler
apweiler
Victor Jongeneel
Victor Jongeneel
Ron D. Appel
Ron D. Appel
Jean-Marc Combette
Jean-Marc Combette
Medabiotech
Medabiotech
Moinat
Moinat
Robin Offord
Robin Offord
Robert Blitzer
LarsLAB
Robert Blitzer

They look like they've come in via the Internet, as they're international names. Some of the names in the list are real too, being people who I work with. There are some PC command lines in there too.

Every time this happens, the file increases in size. The first time it happened, what was a 6-page Word document became 60 pages (with the addition of these lists). On subsequent occasions, files become 100, 200 and 300 pages long.

Norton reveals nothing. Any ideas?

 

[Rincewind42]

I'm running Word 2001 sr1 on an iBook with OS9.2.

Occassionally, especially when multiple Word documents are open, the program will freeze. The only option is either to force quit or restart the machine. In either instance, Word offers to rescue the crashed document - this is essential otherwise the work is lost completely.

They look like they've come in via the Internet, as they're international names. Some of the names in the list are real too, being people who I work with. There are some PC command lines in there too.

Every time this happens, the file increases in size. The first time it happened, what was a 6-page Word document became 60 pages (with the addition of these lists). On subsequent occasions, files become 100, 200 and 300 pages long.

Norton reveals nothing. Any ideas?

MS Word keeps track of a LOT of data behind the scenes, users who have opened and modified the file and the location that it was saved to each time. When word recovers the document, it is probably not identifying that this is it's own meta data, but considers it part of the document instead, thus inflating the size of the document. It's nothing particularly interesting unless you don't want to be tracked with the particular file.

 

[MrNolan]

Thanks for that.

Some of it could indeed be meta data - but the documents haven't been circulated to most of the people on the list. It's 200 pages of complete strangers who I've never had any kind of contact with.