My Doom Virus

'The clueless users who refuse to upgrade'
By Tim Mullen, SecurityFocus
Posted: 03/02/2004 at 11:45 GMT
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Microsoft can end the scourge of e-mail viruses by ending its support for old software, and the clueless users who refuse to upgrade, writes SecurityFocus columnist Tim Mullen.

Well here we go again.

We are suffering through yet another email-borne virus (this one called Novarg) whose infection has reportedly trumped out all others in the infamous history of malicious computer code.

Was the vector some l337 0-day 'sploit? Nope. Was it a complex multi-layer program leveraging several unpatched vulnerabilities? Nope. It was -- wait for it -- an executable attachment in an email. What genius! The author of Novarg (or MyDoom, or whatever you want to call it) really put his noodle to the test when he cooked this one up, huh?

I would like to think that in this day and age people would know better than to open executables in an e-mail. I'd also like to be able to flap my arms and fly to the moon. Opening attachments in e-mail is one par with group needle-sharing after having unprotected sex in a Third World orgy. Yet, with an estimated 30 per cent [peak] of world-wide e-mail traffic being Novarg, it is clear that millions are willing to blindly point-and-click their way into infection while a tempest of white noise rages in the part of their brain where conscious thought should be.

Buy yourself a copy of Norton Antivirus for £39.00 and forget all about emial borne virus attachments! (Crox)