Computers > Bugs and Viruses
Bugs and Viruses: News, Information and Reviews
We're well and deep into April 1 now, and if you were to believe some of the reports and hype on the internet, we should've all been paying in bottle caps right about now. As any sane person already saw coming, the Windows worm Conficker didn't do anything. It just kind of sat there, patiently mocking all those who did not update their machines properly.
Wed, 01 Apr 2009 13:48:46 GMT
"Judgment day has arrived for owners of 30GB (and only 30GB) Zunes. The music player inexplicably entered a worldwide coma last night, and players are completely non responsive." [Kroc: I wonder if this is anything like the bug that caused Windows 98 to crash after 49 days when the tick-count exceeded 32-bits :P]
Wed, 31 Dec 2008 17:12:52 GMT
Dutch, French, Italian, Portuguese, and Spanish users of the popular anti-virus software AVG have discovered a nasty surprise. AVG has mistakenly identified a core Windows system file, user32.dll, as a Trojan, and summarily deletes it, b0rking Windows. AVG has announced they're working on a fix.
Wed, 12 Nov 2008 17:09:36 GMT
There's a bug in Android that crosses over from the realm of serious into self-parody: "It turns out the bug in Android I wrote about yesterday was worse than we thought. When the phone booted it started up a command shell as root and sent every keystroke you ever typed on the keyboard from then on to that shell. Thus every word you typed, in addition to going to the foreground application would be silently and invisibly interpreted as a command and executed with superuser privileges. Wow!"
Sun, 09 Nov 2008 16:50:56 GMT
"Antivirus software on your personal computer could become a thing of the past thanks to a new "cloud computing" approach to malicious software detection developed at the University of Michigan. The researchers' new approach, called CloudAV, moves antivirus functionality into the "network cloud" and off personal computers. CloudAV analyzes suspicious files using multiple antivirus and behavioral detection programs simultaneously. Traditional antivirus software that resides on a personal computer checks documents and programs as they are accessed. Because of performance constraints and program incompatibilities, only one antivirus detector is typically used at a time. The researchers see promising opportunities...
Tue, 26 Aug 2008 12:17:59 GMT
Mac Antivirus developer Intego might have stumbled across an OS X specific virus being offered for auction that targets a previously unknown ZIP archive vulnerability. From Intego's posting, it appears that an enterprising auctioneer seems determined to make sure that his name is one that is not forgotten when it comes to Apple security, claiming that his exploit is a poisoned ZIP archive that will "KO the system and Hard Drive" when unarchived.
Thu, 24 Jul 2008 18:01:25 GMT
1983. The year of the IBM PC XT, the Apple Lisa, Pioneer 10 leaving the solar system, and Hooters opening up shop in Florida. It's also the birthyear of a 25 year old BSD bug, squashed only a few days ago.
Sat, 10 May 2008 20:27:05 GMT
"For at least a decade, the standard advice to every computer user has been to run antivirus software. But new, more commercial, more complex and stealthier types of malware have people in the industry asking: will antivirus software be effective for much longer? Among the threats they see are malware that uses the ability of the latest processors to run virtual machines that would be hidden from antivirus programs." Note: Please note that our icon contest is still running! So if you have an idea on how to rework this story's icon, read this.
Sun, 23 Sep 2007 10:54:32 GMT
A lot of people have been emailing us about an issue we are having with one of our ads taking over OSNews. Thank you all for emailing us, the information provided is of good use to us. We are currently working on the problem, and will let you know once it has been fixed. We would like to apologise for the inconvenience. Update by DA: I think that I've tracked down the offender. Read more for details Update 2: This time I think we really fixed it.
Sat, 28 Jul 2007 11:07:54 GMT
"For about 20 years now we've been using the term computer viruses to describe self-replicating programs. Although such programs had previously been found on Apple computers, viruses entered the PC world in early 1986 with the Brain virus."
Thu, 06 Jul 2006 10:31:01 GMT
"Lately I've been blogging quite a bit on the state of on-line journalism. One aspect of that topic that I haven't touched on for awhile is the way in which a story breaks, builds, morphs and spreads electronically. The recent announcement of the Backdoor.Ginwui virus provides an interesting opportunity to do this once again, in order to see who addressed the story and how (including by me), and what, if anything, it all means." OSNews did not report on this Backdoor.Ginwui virus.
Sun, 28 May 2006 15:03:05 GMT
Virus researchers at Kaspersky Lab have found proof-of-concept code for a cross-platform virus capable of infecting both Windows and Linux systems. In an alert posted to Viruslist, Kaspersky said the sample virus has been given a dual name - Virus.Linux.Bi.a/ Virus.Win32.Bi.a - and highlighted the way attackers are targeting multiple platforms in malware attacks. "The virus doesn't have any practical application," the company said in the alert. "It's classic proof-of-concept code, written to show that it is possible to create a cross-platform virus."
Mon, 10 Apr 2006 21:17:49 GMT
Alerts went out Tuesday from several security companies warning users of an in-the-wild Trojan horse able to infect nearly any cell phone. The Trojan, named Redbrowser.a by McAfee, F-Secure, and the discovering vendor Kaspersky Labs, can attack any device - smart phone, PDA, or cell phone - that runs Java 2 Micro Edition, Sun Microsystem's version for consumer electronics devices.
Thu, 02 Mar 2006 12:38:34 GMT
"Virtual Bugzilla server is a virtual machine with pre-installed Bugzilla. Instead of spending hours (sometimes days) installing Bugzilla, why not just download a ready-to-use server? Virtual Bugzilla server is a VMWare virtual machine. You will need a free VMWare Player to run the server."
Mon, 27 Feb 2006 16:48:20 GMT
Trading was suspended for an hour at Russia's main stock exchange because of a computer virus, the Russian Trading Systems, or RTS, said Friday. Data processing was paralyzed late Thursday afternoon as specialists rushed to localize the virus and switch off the infected computer, according to a statement from the exchange. No permanent damage was caused and no information was lost. Spokeswoman Zoya Konovkova said it was not clear what virus had led to the shutdown. According to RTS vice president Dmitry Shatskoi, the virus entered the system via a computer used to test new software, which was connected to the Internet.
Sat, 04 Feb 2006 14:15:44 GMT