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Love You San worm
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The great mea culpa from MS!
It seems that the folks at MS are trying some damage control PR:
"Microsoft spokesman Sean Sundwall acknowledged that the blame does not really lie with customers.
"Ultimately, it's a flaw in our software," he said."
[edit]
CNN.com seems to have re-directed this link to a new related story that doesn't include this quote. The original story can still be found elsewhere on CNN.com under the title "Warnings Did Little to Stop Internet Worm". -- i._h.
[/edit]
also...
It seems that the folks at MS are trying some damage control PR:
"Microsoft spokesman Sean Sundwall acknowledged that the blame does not really lie with customers.
"Ultimately, it's a flaw in our software," he said."
[edit]
CNN.com seems to have re-directed this link to a new related story that doesn't include this quote. The original story can still be found elsewhere on CNN.com under the title "Warnings Did Little to Stop Internet Worm". -- i._h.
[/edit]
also...
I've honestly got no idea how a BIOS update works -- but I guess one is a bit naive these days to believe them when they call something ROM. Just because it says "Read-only" doesn't necessarily mean it is read-only. Disillusioned yet again -- *[sigh]*.
The thing about Microsoft's near-daily security patches is that home users don't have the time, and often, the computer literacy required to also be full-time system maintenance experts, even with Windows Update. The constant barrage of patches is just numbing...and the fact that a constant barrage of patches is even necessary is just aggravating. Worse, dedicated system maintenance experts testify that Microsoft's patches often break other things.
As I'm the only kind of system maintenance my elderly parents have, I'm planning on downloading the patches to CD so that if MS's servers are downed this weekend when I'm there to apply them, I can still update their computers.
This just pisses me off beyond all bounds. If Mom weren't so technophobic and unwilling to have to learn yet another system, and if Dad weren't such a DOS guy, I'd almost be willing to BUY them Macs just so I didn't have to deal with this.
As I'm the only kind of system maintenance my elderly parents have, I'm planning on downloading the patches to CD so that if MS's servers are downed this weekend when I'm there to apply them, I can still update their computers.
This just pisses me off beyond all bounds. If Mom weren't so technophobic and unwilling to have to learn yet another system, and if Dad weren't such a DOS guy, I'd almost be willing to BUY them Macs just so I didn't have to deal with this.
If you find the original Warning does little to slow internet worm article on CNN.com, the author bemoans the exact same fact regarding his mother -- so you're not alone.
Heh. One of my professors was just saying that he tries to stay away from windows updates for his wife's XP box because he's already had patches cripple his video performance. He'-s a big *nix geek. And he's a humanities prof. You're right on, though, about the average computer user not being very capable of installing a patch. Fact is, a lot of these people hear the media lecturing them about not installing the latest patch, (after all, both Microsoft and the DHS warned about the hole over a month ago) and then they feel guilty and stupid because now it's there fault but they don't know what to do. Now to most of us here, installing a patch is not that hard, but the vast majority of pc owners just don't grasp even some of the most fundamental concepts. But if Microsoft is to blame it's customers, then it should only sell to those it can verify are relatively knowledgeable of windows.
You're right on, though, about the average computer user not being very capable of installing a patch. Fact is, a lot of these people hear the media lecturing them about not installing the latest patch, (after all, both Microsoft and the DHS warned about the hole over a month ago) and then they feel guilty and stupid because now it's there fault but they don't know what to do. Now to most of us here, installing a patch is not that hard, but the vast majority of pc owners just don't grasp even some of the most fundamental concepts. But if Microsoft is to blame it's customers, then it should only sell to those it can verify are relatively knowledgeable of windows.
yesterday i was watching the news and CNN (no i don't usually watch CNN - i was bored), and they mentioned that this virus attack is "to be expected due to the millions of lines of coding required for the operating system." pffft...and OS X, Linux, etc etc doesn't ahve as many lines??
My wife is a visiting nurse and so can download her patients at home. Last night she could not, frustrating. Had to leave early this morning to the office. The IT person said that the server was down due to the P Worm. Our local news said that other hospitals were also affected. I just wonder if they will ever learn?
probably to them, a one button mouse is as shocking to them as the virus. apple can never win this kind of market without certain software. my family and i have been really good friends with my ortho who gave me my braces. He has someg G4's but just to view his pictures he xrays and stuff. but other than that, its all windows softwae.Originally posted by wdlove
My wife is a visiting nurse and so can download her patients at home. Last night she could not, frustrating. Had to leave early this morning to the office. The IT person said that the server was down due to the P Worm. Our local news said that other hospitals were also affected. I just wonder if they will ever learn?
iJon
Re: Unsafe at any speed...
Brilliant point. I never thought of this. Perhaps an administration that it is to critical software (like operating systems) as the FDA is to drugs.
In that case, Windows would be dispensed with as if it were acetone being pawned as a hypertension drug.
Brilliant point. I never thought of this. Perhaps an administration that it is to critical software (like operating systems) as the FDA is to drugs.
In that case, Windows would be dispensed with as if it were acetone being pawned as a hypertension drug.
... I haven't seen so much misinformation in one spot since the last time i looked at grc.com...
Are any of you even aware of the fact that the patch for this vulnerability was available over a month ago? I didn't think so.
So before you go spouting off about MS not fixing things, check your info first. And as for updates, how much brainpower does it take to hit a few links on windowsupdate, or enable auto-updates in XP? No worse then the update manager in OSX.
Are any of you even aware of the fact that the patch for this vulnerability was available over a month ago? I didn't think so.
So before you go spouting off about MS not fixing things, check your info first. And as for updates, how much brainpower does it take to hit a few links on windowsupdate, or enable auto-updates in XP? No worse then the update manager in OSX.
Do you mean service pack 4 ? The SP that nobody in our office installed because it creates major problems with 3DSmax files ?
Anyway, this worm was a real windows problem, whether MS reacted fast enough or not. It shouldn't have been possible in the first place.
But I agree that people are fast to judge MS on this one and feel on the safe side with OSX. Do people really think OSX is that much safer ? Everytime Apple releases a security fix I think "thank god there is not more hackers/worms/viruses on OSX..."
Anyway, this worm was a real windows problem, whether MS reacted fast enough or not. It shouldn't have been possible in the first place.
But I agree that people are fast to judge MS on this one and feel on the safe side with OSX. Do people really think OSX is that much safer ? Everytime Apple releases a security fix I think "thank god there is not more hackers/worms/viruses on OSX..."
My coworker caught the Chernobyl virus in 1999. Sure enough on the Chernobyl anniversary it over-wrote the master boot record, partition table, and over-wrote the NVRAM in the bios. Completely hosed the PC. Had to swap motherboards, as the BIOS NVRAM chip was soldered onto the board. Once the machine finally powered up and booted, the partition table was gone completely. I love you, Microsoft.
Unfortunately, more than you think. With the majority of the population still on dialup as well, (and, for example, the updates Microsoft publishes are 30MB sometimes), and the lack of knowledge to do that - the numbers make you sick.
Look, the people who right viruses are anti-Microsoft, and pro Linux, and Mac. They do it because they can. People someone could just as easily go after Macs with a virus. They do run Macros just like a PC, but when you are only 3% of the market, does it make sense to do it?
Originally posted by Ryan1524
yesterday i was watching the news and CNN (no i don't usually watch CNN - i was bored), and they mentioned that this virus attack is "to be expected due to the millions of lines of coding required for the operating system." pffft...and OS X, Linux, etc etc doesn't ahve as many lines??
That statement on their part is just plain ignorant.
But at the same time, there's just as many vulnerabilities out there for UNIX machines. The realpath() security update on 8-14-2003, I received about a week earlier from freebsd-announce (we run FreeBSD at our joint). There was a vulnerability in Cisco IOS earlier in the month - and the list goes on and on.
Since Microsoft products make up the greatest percentage of installations, and the ``ease of use'' of windows makes even the truly computer illiterate ``administrators'', it's a fact of Microsoft, I suppose.
Actually, there were a few threads here (one started by yours truly) regarding the group that discovered the flaw and the patch. So, yes, in general the readers of Macrumors are probably aware that MS made a patch available when they did -- about a month before the worm.
The point that came up in those threads, however, was that:
(a) lots of people -- whether they could or not -- aren't going to patch their systems because they treat their computers like their toasters: "does it work? then it must be fine"; and
(b) lots of system administrators are not going to patch their systems because they've had past problems with MS security patches conflicting with their settings, their applications, their networking, and even each other.
That's the point. No one patched, not because they didn't have time, but because they're either not tech savvy enough or too tech savvy.
That's not "spouting off".
I agree that virii that spread because a user runs an executable file that they got in e-mail are writable for Macs and, since they depend on people being duped into running them, can dupe Mac users.
The tougher question is whether system-level security (like the flaw that the MSBlast worm used) is better due to the underlying FreeBSD core.
Yeah, the tech people in the press were saying how August was a bad month for this because lots of people (like all of France) are on vacation, so we'll get more outbreaks as these people get back to work, open their e-mail....Originally posted by Backtothemac
Wow, I am getting hammered with this virus. 20 emails with it in the last hour