Wednesday, March 25, 2009

Ever Heard of Conficker?


The Conficker Internet worm could strike at infected computers around the world on April 1, a security expert warned Monday. Conficker is a sophisticated piece of malicious computer software, or malware, that installs itself on a Windows PC’s hard drive via specially written Web pages. It then conceals itself on a computer.

Graham Cluley of the British security firm Sophos confirmed that Conficker is programmed “to hunt for new instructions on April 1.” However, he added, “This does not mean that anything is going to happen, or that the worm is actually going to do anything. Simply, it is scheduled to hunt a wider range of Web sites for instructions on that date.”

One strange thing about Conficker is that no one yet has any idea what it is programmed to do.

In February, Cluley told The Times: “It’s as if someone is assembling an army of computers around the world, but hasn’t yet decided where to point them.”

A worst-case scenario for April 1 would be for all the world’s millions of infected computers to receive simultaneous instructions to attack, or to flood the Internet with spam email.

So, is your antivirus software up to date? How about your adware software? Okay, I don’t really want to hear from all of you Mac users telling me how much better your system is and how safe it is. I’ve heard that song before, all 12 verses of it!

I just wonder, who has this much time to write hacking software that will attack other computers? Why spend your life doing that? It’s beyond me.

And yes Rick, before you comment, we’ll go ahead and say, “It’s the Democrats’ fault!”

3 comments:

  1. Steve: I was waiting for the "April Fools" deal. I too wonder about "who has the time to do something like this" but then remember that there are people who have nothing important to do but this type of garbage. It's like you want to go up to someone and say, "Leave my stuff alone. I don't bother yours!" I hope it comes out to not being true but just another headline grab.

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  2. To be honest, I hadn't even thought of blaming the Dems for this one; but we might as well.

    Remember the good ole days before wide spread internet use when the only way to get a virus was to load it up yourself from a disk?

    Wow... memories....

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  3. Is Bill Gates a Democrat? It's not difficult to write something that will kill a Windows machine. It's no different from any other form of vandalism. The funniest thing about this April 1st gag is that it's so little different from the anti-virus companies' usual copy. They are the people who benefit from all this: if MS Windows was secure none of them would exist.

    [me: Debian Linux headbanger turned Mac fanboy]

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Thank you for sharing your thoughts! I can't wait to read what you have written.