Posted on 08/22/2003 9:37:05 AM PDT by FairOpinion
OAK RIDGE, Tenn., Aug. 21 /PRNewswire/ -- "If you think the recent blackout in the Northeastern US wreaked havoc, watch out for the attack of the 'Worms,'" says executive and author John Mariotti. "The Sobig F and Blaster worms are just warm-ups for the real attack," states Mariotti a noted corporate executive, business writer and novelist. "Nobody paid attention to the warnings before 9/11, and nobody is listening to the warnings now."
"When I wrote 'THE SILENCE,' I knew the technology existed to plant 'back doors and Trojan Horses' in millions of computers. When an evil force takes control of all those computers, the US's entire communications and computer infrastructure is vulnerable," warns Mariotti. "The gaps in Microsoft's widely used software worsen the risk, but the real tragedy is the total inability of Homeland Security to deal with cyber-security. It is bogged down in a morass of indecision and confusion."
When asked why warnings like "THE SILENCE" are being ignored, Mariotti said, "There is no central authority in communications and information technology, therefore a sort of technological anarchy exists. With no central organizing body, there is no coordination. The US government agencies, the FBI, CIA, et. al. have difficulty just coordinating their own systems and are ill-equipped to solve a crisis of massive proportions in this field."
The government is fighting wars on too many fronts to worry about a hypothetical cyber-attack. But no one believed the gruesome ending Tom Clancy's novel "Debt of Honor" could be a prophecy of future terrorist attacks -- but sadly, it was. Mariotti's reaction to this, "I hope this is 'much ado about nothing,' but I fear it isn't. A cyber-terrorist attack in the near future is a virtual certainty. All that's uncertain is when and whether it will end like 'THE SILENCE.'"
Well-known technology writers have written about the risks recently, including George Hulme in Information Week, Simson Garfinkel in MIT Technology Review and Dan Verton of ComputerWorld, in his book entitled "Black Ice." Garfinkel called the recent plethora of worm attacks "proofs of concept" for a cyber-attack. Verton's novel draws on prior crisis simulations that are chillingly close to reality.
"THE SILENCE." Writers Showcase Press. www.thesilence.info.
The current worm/virus situation requires at least as large an effort to get under control. Customers should demand bug-free certified and tested code from their vendors, as they demanded Y2K-Ready certifications. That is the only to stop these attacks -- remove the vulnerabilities.
The current system is designed so that everyone makes money and no one is responsible for anything. From throwing release after release of buggy code over the fence (which must be constantly updated), to AV companies insisting on subscription-based AV applications which will never be able to anticipate the next attack (and must ALSO be constantly updated).
Solving the root cause of these problems will require absolute acceptance of major change in/to the software industry. And that will never happen.
FREE PC PROTECTION:
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I do agree that many who own PCs don't have an inkling of a clue when it comes to security, anti-virus, etc. Most people don't have a clue how to rebuild a carburator either. When they have a problem with their car, they go to a technician. It's the same with PCs, except computers, at least as far as a personal appliance, aren't considered as necessary as an automobile. This will work itself out in the long run, but I think we'll see even more virus/worm attacks before it does.
Let's face it, other than lost productivity and one nuclear power plant that was already off-line, there really hasn't been any damage proven yet. We still have yet to see what comes out of the latest blackout.
Corporate networks definitely need to ramp-up their security. Mr. FourPeas works in IT security and there *still* isn't the emphasis there that I'd expect. Apparently when it comes to the bottom line, the various outages caused by Blaster, Sobig, et al. really aren't that worrisome to the decision makers in corporations. So be it.
There may be a call someday for good computer security. If so, we have all the resources necessary to provide it. Until then, apparently the consensus is the status quo is just fine.
Mr. FourPeas works for a company with thousands of computers in more countries than I care to count utilizing wireless, VPN, you-name-it. Almost every time, the virus or worm causes at least some problems. Ignorance and laziness is a part of it, but certainly not all. For the most part, even to large corporations, IT security is not that important. Budgets are small; influence is minimal; standards are a joke. Trying to design a complex network where everything works seemlessly is not a piece of cake. Verifying that current revs of anti-virus and firewalls are rolled out to thousands of computers in a timely fashion requires time, money, clout, sufficient policies, enforcement, etc. It's just not THAT simple.
Lazy consumers? Perhaps.
Lazy network managers? Only the one's for very small sites.
Let's take Blaster, for example and a typical enterprise, say, about 1000 servers and 10,000 desktops.
Each of those servers runs applications. Not all the same application, sometimes a mix of different ones, sometimes single purpose apps, sometimes apps in standby for a disaster recovery situation.
Let's say that there are, conservatively, 1000 servers with 100 different apps running on them. Each server configuration must be patched and then tested before going into production. That requires that either you have an exact duplicate machine for each production machine (which is prohibitively expensive both in hardware and Windows licensing costs) or you have a few machines that you can format, install Windows, install and configure the software, install the patch and test.
That means formating, installing and testing around between 100 and 500 servers in order to test every configuration. And that doesn't include testing every desktop configuration too.
Considering that a typical install evolution consisting of Windows, application and system configuration can take around 2 hours per server, plus add on a 24 hour window to let the machine run (during which time the machine can't be formated and move on to the next test platform) it's not unusual to require 3 to 6 months to test all servers and then patch them once a patch has shipped.
Blaster gave them about three weeks.
I dont get your estimates. Once the patch came out, it took us less than 36 hours days to write scripts and patch 450 servers and workstations.
Yes I can considering I just spent all day killing off the Welchia worm after spending a full day last week killing off the Blaster worm. Our company is well protected compared to most and they still got in. This is starting to have real economic impact. Our company is small, but it cost several thousand dollars worth of lost productivity and man hours.
The threat is real and will wind up impacting all of us.
And if it is, there are many thousands here who will see that as a challenge. I'll bet we'll learn to bounce a cyber bomb right back at them.
You're welcome -- glad to hear you found the links useful.
Yeah, it IS nice, innit? <|:)~ It can "learn" as you use it, so its filters get better over time. It will also alert you to viruses that are attached to some e-mail/SPAM.
The AdAware instruction manual says that the Quarantine-files are used to isolate and backup items detected during the scan, giving you an option to reinstall them at a later time. Just open the instruction manual and do a search on "quarantine".
I'm not sure -- I've just always used ZA and have found it to be EXCELLENT.
Mozilla gives you better control over popups and cookie/spyware management than MSIE. Another alternative browser that gives you similar control is Opera (also free, but with ads).
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