[ale] RE: I'm really getting sick of these "vague" Linux virus announcements

[greg at turnstep.com]

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> > Now I've seen a few of these Linux virus announcements over
> the last few months.  Few details, little substance. 
> 
> 	The problem lies in the source. The source is a VNU news
> brief. News briefs tend to be...well, brief. What do you
> expect? :) 

Well, how about some facts? How about less speculation and 
scaremongering? They mention that Apache has a much 
larger share of the webserver market than IIS and suggest 
that a virus for Apache would be much worse than Code Red. 
This is pure FUD. First, this particular exploit is in no way 
related to web servers, as Code Red is. It has nothing to do 
with it any more so than any other program on the Linux box. 
Second, Apache has a totally different design than IIS and 
will *never* be vulnerable to the same sort of exploit. It just 
ain't gonna happen. Even if you could somehow pass it an 
arbitrary command, Apache by default runs as a very low 
priority user. Third, people who run Apache are more likely to 
be involved in the nitty-gritty details of their box than their 
point-and-click-install IIS brethren, and thus will detect and 
patch problems more quickly. Fourth, it is not automated like 
Code Red but requires active user participation to forward 
it.
I agree with Bryan - this is poor news reporting, and told 
us next to nothing about the actual virus, which is (IMO) 
pretty harmless. When was the last time a Linux admin 
you know received an attachment from someone (known 
or unknown) in email with no explanation on it, saved it 
to disk, set it executable, and ran it as root?

Greg Sabino Mullane
greg at turnstep.com
PGP Key: 0x14964AC8 200109100824

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