Michael Gracie » worm http://michaelgracie.com Clever Tagline Unavailable At Publication Time Thu, 20 Nov 2008 23:14:58 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6 en The curious and contrarian in today’s tech http://michaelgracie.com/2007/07/19/the-curious-and-contrarian-in-todays-tech/ http://michaelgracie.com/2007/07/19/the-curious-and-contrarian-in-todays-tech/#comments Thu, 19 Jul 2007 19:22:32 +0000 Michael Gracie http://michaelgracie.com/2007/07/19/the-curious-and-contrarian-in-todays-tech/
  • Today Vonage hit new lows as another competitor jumped into the VoIP fray. It’s a new company called Ooma, who is offering free service in exchange for a high-priced phone. Curious - will everyone in Hollywood jump on this since star Ashton Kutcher is involved? Contrarian - the business model is the exact opposite of the cell-phone set (where it seems all the telecomm growth is).
  • Ebay posted some good numbers, but folks are really talking about how their auction business is stagnating. Curious - what is doing well at Ebay, since everyone also seems down on all the acquisitions? Contrarian - a 50% rise in the net is nothing to shrug at, but people are shrugging anyway…I thought the idea of being in business was to make money (but what the hell do I know). Also noted - Ebayers often pay more than fair value for items - please send similar business models my way…please?!
  • A new OS X based worm could soon be on the loose. The anonymous creator said they were tired of hearing about OS X being so secure. Curious - will I soon be sticking my foot in my mouth along with all the other comfy OS X users? Contrarian - if you’re so tired of the cockiness, release the damn thing already (instead of blathering about it).
  • Paul Kedrosky’s new Blackberry has 6 fonts, none of which he likes. Curious - my old Blackberry has 11 fonts…why would Blackberry cut down on fonts? Contrarian - I like BBCasual and I’ll probably never change it…hence I don’t care if it has a memorable name or not.

    • UPDATE: Carlo Longino goes contrarian on Ooma. Meanwhile, I may be waiting a long time for that OS X bug…the “creator” is on the lam.

    ]]>     http://michaelgracie.com/2007/07/19/the-curious-and-contrarian-in-todays-tech/feed/     Happy New Year, from the zombies http://michaelgracie.com/2006/12/31/happy-new-year-from-the-zombies/ http://michaelgracie.com/2006/12/31/happy-new-year-from-the-zombies/#comments Sun, 31 Dec 2006 16:06:34 +0000 Michael Gracie http://www.michaelgracie.com/happy-new-year-from-the-zombies/

    Don’t believe anyone who wishes you a happy new year, at least if the greeting comes via email.

    UPDATE: The “Happy New Year” worm is still spreading on the net.

    Late to the punch…I say. You’d think those worms would know something about internet time (or is that the news I should be criticising?).

    ]]>     http://michaelgracie.com/2006/12/31/happy-new-year-from-the-zombies/feed/     Give me an N…no wait, make that an M http://michaelgracie.com/2005/04/19/give-me-an-nno-wait-make-that-an-m/ http://michaelgracie.com/2005/04/19/give-me-an-nno-wait-make-that-an-m/#comments Wed, 20 Apr 2005 06:54:23 +0000 Michael Gracie http://www.michaelgracie.com/give-me-an-nno-wait-make-that-an-m/

    This morning F-Secure posts a notice on a new variation of the Sober worm, and they call it Sober-N. Then, late this evening Sophos says there is a new worm out there, and they call it Sober-M.

    Now both descriptions sound alike, and the timing is a little uncanny. Either someone miscounted when labeling the next derivation of the nasty email bug, or these things are getting changed awfully fast. Either way, it could cause problems.

    If someone screwed up, and someone else doesn’t get the story straight, some anti-virus firm is going to get their .DAT files screwed up, and an innocent subscriber is going to get burned. For those not in the know, a .DAT file is a library of virus definitions on a computer system that tells the anti-virus software what to look for when scanning for viruses. If you don’t frequently update those DATs, you are going to get burned.

    Now if these Sober worms are getting changed so quickly now that more than one new one is popping up a day, everyone (using Windows) is in trouble. That phenomena would create what is called a “zero-day scenario,” where a virus is able to spread far and wide the first day out, before anti-virus firms can get a hold of the code and develop a definition for it. In such a case, you get burned.

    The best bet right now is to not open up any file attachments that are .ZIP files, if you aren’t expecting one. Even if it comes from a friend, don’t open it, period.

    If you are really paranoid (like I am), go buy a PowerBook (like I did), then you’ll have little to worry about.

    ]]>     http://michaelgracie.com/2005/04/19/give-me-an-nno-wait-make-that-an-m/feed/     Reuters IM shut down by worm http://michaelgracie.com/2005/04/15/reuters-im-shut-down-by-worm/ http://michaelgracie.com/2005/04/15/reuters-im-shut-down-by-worm/#comments Fri, 15 Apr 2005 14:21:29 +0000 Michael Gracie http://www.michaelgracie.com/reuters-im-shut-down-by-worm/

    For those of you that think instant messaging attacks are no big deal, catch this…

    Yesterday, a new strain of W32/Kelvir worm worked its way into the Reuters news agency’s secure enterprise IM platform, forcing it offline. It could not have come at a worse time for Reuters.

    While you use your IM to chat with your pals about what time to go out for coffee, others rely on it as a key channel in their business information flow. I am not talking about plain old news in Reuters’ case, but instead financial markets information.

    Securities dealers and financial information providers rely heavily on IM platforms to communicate. And with the markets taking a pummeling yesterday, it could not have come at a worse time for Reuters. They were essentially out of “the loop” for a good part of the trading day.

    You can catch the whole report in was back online Friday, just in time to wind up a fantastic week on Wall Street.

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