














Comments     Threshold


botnets lol
By Argon18 on 7/10/2011 2:54:07 PM , Rating: -1
Linux, OSX, and all the other unix-like OS's win again, for being impervious to these botnet viruses. Have fun Microsofties!

RE: botnets lol
By SilthDraeth on 7/10/2011 3:00:08 PM , Rating: 5
Calling other OS's impervious is just as ignorant as calling anything indestructible.

RE: botnets lol
By B3an on 7/10/2011 3:02:10 PM , Rating: 2
LOL they're not impervious, especially in the case of OSX which is the least secure OS of all three. These people just dont bother with botnets for these OS's as the market share is so low, but i can see it happening to OSX if it keeps gaining market. Linux will never go anywhere though.

RE: botnets lol
By macdevdude on 7/10/11, Rating: -1
RE: botnets lol
By Warwulf on 7/10/2011 3:34:19 PM , Rating: 5
The truth is no one bothers with OS X because hardly anybody uses it. What are they going to do, write a virus/botnet/worm that targets 10% of PCs running OS X?


RE: botnets lol
By Reclaimer77 on 7/10/2011 10:01:40 PM , Rating: 5
10%? I think you're being too generous.

RE: botnets lol
By rudolphna on 7/10/2011 3:53:31 PM , Rating: 5
You're name says it all.

Dude, stfu or gtfo. Those security conferences are evidence enough. You know, the "Hack a computer, win a computer" competitions. Windows, Linux machins take hours, days sometimes. Macs? A few minutes, every time.

Apple is the most insecure platform of them all. Again, the reason that they don't bother writing that many viruses and go through the work of creating a botnet for mac users, is because there are so few macs out there, relatively speaking, compared to Windows, that there is no real benefit in doing so. Mac users should be proud, they are basically considered too inconsequential and irrelevant to deal with.

RE: botnets lol
By themaster08 on 7/10/2011 5:17:21 PM , Rating: 5
If the OS was so insecure, why wouldn't malware writers just write really quick and easy programs to steal Apple owners' credit cards?? Oh right, because you're just making stuff up.
Sure, it's called MacDefender.

RE: botnets lol
By Flunk on 7/10/2011 9:21:41 PM , Rating: 3
"single-user mindset"? You're thinking of Windows 9X. NT (which was a total rewrite of the OS) was always designed as a multi-user, graphical OS.

RE: botnets lol
By tecknurd on 7/10/2011 11:32:54 PM , Rating: 2
OS X/Linux were built on the multi-user security-minded world of Unix. Windows, by contrast, was originally built with a single-user mindset, thus why the platform is inherently less secure.

Yes, Mac OS X and GNU/Linux is built with a multi-user security minded world, but these operating systems used for desktops are setup differently. Ubuntu for example, sets up root with a random password and ask the normal user for their password when doing administrating tasks. Is this secure? Not exactly. The root is used when it is absolutely necessary, but asking a user's password for everything that root does is not any secure than Windows. Ubuntu uses sudo for substituting a user for root privileges, but it is supposed to be used for certain users and not all users.

Mac OS X is the same as Ubuntu.

For everybody's information, botnets can run any operating system. Botnet creators just attacks Windows because it is easy to tamper and yes it is majority OS.

RE: botnets lol
By spacemonkey211 on 7/11/2011 12:08:27 PM , Rating: 2
Actually Ubuntu locks out root with no password and then requires a password to access root. Since it doesn't have one, root is effectively blocked from direct access.

Sudo is used to elevate your status to root using your own password. To use sudo you need root access to change it's config to give you access. The initial "admin" user is given total sudo control.

Root is only as secure as the sudo users passwords are in Ubuntu and without root access you are limited to your home folder and maybe /tmp.

RE: botnets lol
By hillsurfer on 7/11/2011 1:20:49 AM , Rating: 2
Unix was originally designed for sharing information, not for keeping it secure. It's evolved a lot since, but it's not impervious, just a waste of time for anyone wanting millions of computers for a botnet. If you managed to convince the world that every computer should have a unix-based OS, and everyone on the planet did such, then every botnet would run on a unix-based OS.

So, by promoting unix/osx/linux, if everyone takes your advice (which is unlikely), you're making the world a safer place for unix/osx/linux botnets.

RE: botnets lol
By icanhascpu on 7/10/11, Rating: -1
RE: botnets lol
By StevoLincolnite on 7/10/2011 3:07:01 PM , Rating: 2

Bad Troll, go to your room!

And for the record... Anything made by Man is prone to fail eventually.

RE: botnets lol
By phazers on 7/10/2011 3:08:48 PM , Rating: 5


First Mac OS X botnet activated
By Mark Hattersley,
April 17, 2009 01:10 PM ET

The first botnet created with Mac computers running OS X software has been activated, according to reports filtering out across the Internet...

Occurs to me that certain smug putz's could stand to get out of their basement more often, seeing as how this news is over 2 yrs old now..

RE: botnets lol
By PrinceGaz on 7/10/2011 4:51:18 PM , Rating: 3
Exactly. Steve Jobs is my lord and saviour because He keeps me safe every day from these evil botnets infecting Windows computers. I love iDevices and would possibly bow down in prayer towards Cupertino every day if there was an app on the AppStore which provided the correct direction to bow down in.

RE: botnets lol
By jamesjwb on 7/10/2011 5:56:57 PM , Rating: 5
the correct pray position is South of Jobs belly button.

RE: botnets lol
By Tim Thorpe on 7/10/2011 6:20:13 PM , Rating: 3
Its crowded down here!

RE: botnets lol
By MrPerez on 7/10/11, Rating: -1
RE: botnets lol
By Etsp on 7/11/2011 1:05:38 AM , Rating: 2
How is Linux less secure? I mean, specific examples. What metric are you using to make that judgement? Number of security patches? Number of vulnerabilities? Everything I've read that a well configured Linux computer is one of the most secure computing platforms.

RE: botnets lol
By themaster08 on 7/11/2011 2:48:07 AM , Rating: 3
As is a well configured Windows computer. We've all seen what happens to Windows machines that are not kept updated and are abused. As we've seen hackers such as LulzSec take down many, many Unix-based servers that have been ill maintained. Being a multi-user OS didn't save them from LulzSec. Windows is also multi-user. Those poor Macheads just can't find their way out of the 1998. The world remains the same while OS X advances.

Do you really think that every Windows user keeps their system up-to-date with the latest security patches and anti-virus definitions?

The amount of PCs, even in enterprise, that I've worked on, repaired, removed viruses from, and disposed of that are running Windows XP Service Pack 2 or less, with out-of-date virus definitions from 5 anti-virus vendors at the same time is absurd.

Do you know what the average person does when they see an update show up in their notification area? They ignore it. That is the start for many of the problems that Windows users experience. Because they're simply too lazy to click a button that says Update.

RE: botnets lol
By spacemonkey211 on 7/11/2011 12:02:50 PM , Rating: 4
Hate to burst your bubble, but more of the internet is run on GNU/Linux computers. So it is a HUGE target. Linux is very secure... and is constantly under attack.

RE: botnets lol
By Gurthang on 7/11/2011 8:14:32 AM , Rating: 2
Rootkiting botnets move through networks like real human viruses. The trick is to find a vulunrability that can be exploited, exploit the crap out of it with your new code until someone notices and fixes it or creats defenses against it to get enough systems infected to make it worth the time you spent creating the botnet.

The reason there are fewer Linux/OSX botnets has little to do with system security and everything to do with economics. Basically there are too many variations and too few systems using Linux/OSX around to make an attack that will work long enough to make a worthwhile botnet. You live in the 5% and below saftey net similar to typical real vaccination programs so long as 95+% of the population is "immune" via vaccination the remaining population that cannot be vaccinated is "fairly" safe from infection because the herd protects you. In this case your popultation is so sparse and diverse passing the infection on becomes difficult and thus not worth the time.

As to iOS/Android/WP7 time will tell, the way data is metered on cell phones makes it easier to spot unusual activity. I doubt attacks will move beyond annoyance type attacks and data theft type attacks there.

RE: botnets lol
Typical clueless Apple user.



