Microsoft deserves some blame for the rapidly spreading Web virus
Published:
20 August 2003 y., Wednesday
Microsoft deserves some blame for the rapidly spreading Web virus -- but so do network administrators, ISPs, small businesses, and individual PC users. Compared to the images of sweaty Gothamites trudging across the Brooklyn Bridge in 95-degree heat during the massive power blackout, the MS Blaster worm now seems like a walk in the park.
Still, the latest worm to clog corporate networks and kludge the Net wreaked plenty of havoc in its own right. Internet security companies estimated losses from both downtime and wasted manhours in the hundreds of millions of dollars for U.S. companies. And Blaster-infected machines significantly impacted the Internet. The stream of bogus requests generated by the worm slowed DNS (domain name system) servers that act as the phone directories of the Internet. Compromised computers jammed up networks ranging from BMW in Germany to the Maryland Motor Vehicles Dept.
. Like the Slammer and CodeRed worms before it, Blaster targeted computers running Microsoft Windows 2000 and Windows XP operating systems. The worm carries a small program designed to exploit a chink in Redmond's digital armor and insert a file deep into the operating system in the Windows registry system. The registry is a database where the most basic rules that govern how a Windows machine behaves are stored and categorized.
Once Blaster inhabits the registry, it causes computers to restart without warning and to spew out thousands of connection requests per minute, in search of other machines to infect. The sheer volume of traffic caused enough digital noise to bog down networks.
Šaltinis:
businessweek.com
Copying, publishing, announcing any information from the News.lt portal without written permission of News.lt editorial office is prohibited.
The most popular articles
Software company announced new structure_ of it_s business.
more »
A number of MEPs urged Internal Market Commissioner Michel Barnier to come up with common rules to regulate cross border online gambling in Europe.
more »
Think before you post as once you do it is online forever. That was the message on Safer Internet Day marked on 9 February by a seminar in the European Parliament.
more »
50% of European teenagers give out personal information on the web – according to an EU study – which can remain online forever and can be seen by anybody.
more »
When did the Commission start working on social networking sites?
more »
ICSA Labs, an independent division of Verizon Business, is the first independent security-product testing and certification laboratory to earn ISO/IEC 17025 accreditation, validating the laboratory's world-class capabilities.
more »
From today, European citizens, businesses and organisations can register .eu website names using characters from all 23 official languages of the European Union.
more »
Authorities investigated 301 mobile phone services websites in follow-up to EU crackdown on misleading consumer practices.
more »
After nearly 2 years of legislative work the Telecom Package is due to be put to a final vote in Parliament on 24 November in Strasbourg.
more »
The Christian Science Monitor reports that three men have been named as being the masterminds behind the hacking of RBS WorldPay, a subsidiary of the Royal Bank of Scotland.
more »
BAI’s Banking Strategies Insights reports that banks must get serious about improving their ATMs, especially in the area of envelope-free deposit.
more »