Hackers Targeting Home Computers

[Hack Hawk]

Although I originally used the word filter to describe a possible ISP 
action to address certain problems, the following statement from KB was 
more what I meant to suggest.  And also Lynn Wheeler's statement about 
Dynamic IP addresses not being allowed to host HTTP services because it's 
not in the consumer/client agreement anyway.

At 09:02 AM 1/7/02 -0500, KB wrote:
>Once word gets out that letting your computer be breached can get your
>internet account suspended, people might start applying patches, Linux
>might start making some inroads, and Micro$oft might quit shipping so
>many new bugs every week.

Now, since the suggestion/idea prompted several responses, I'd like to 
offer one other opinion to see what some of you think about it.  I know 
that it's possibly been discussed here before, but hopefully I won't get 
flamed too bad.  :)  Sorry, I'm kind of new to this particular list.

When I performed my experiment a few months back, I had the idea to create 
a Code Green worm (like somebody actually did) that would go out and 
forcefully patch those vulnerable systems.  I even went as far as 
developing a small tftp daemon that could serve up the CG virus to other 
infected systems for a short period of time.

In light of all the discussion I've previously read on such matters, I 
decided against implementing the CG counter Virus.

However, I'm starting to think that such counter viruses aren't such a bad 
idea, and here's the primary reason *why* I believe that.

Currently, our government (people like Ashcroft) are slowly taking away our 
freedoms in an effort to gain control over the problem.  Personally, I have 
a real hard time with this.  I don't like Ashcroft and others like him 
having the ability to come into my home and phone lines and monitor 
everything I do.  If they just happen to label me as a potential terrorist, 
then I'm basically f*#$ed and loose all my rights.

I fully appreciate the dangers of our world, and why somebody like Ashcroft 
may want to sacrifice our liberties to gain control of worldly 
problems.  However, there is *another* way.  We can either sit back, and 
let people like Ashcroft take control of the cyber situation, or we can 
step up to the plate, and take control of the problem ourselves.

My non-technical mailing list was my first non-intrusive step up to the 
plate.  Perhaps in the future, stepping up should be a little more 
intrusive.  If the freedoms I value so much are at stake, then maybe the 
rewards outweigh the risk of damaging someone's ego by patching their 
systems for them.  IMHO.

- hawk




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