Posted on 06/27/2011 10:21:23 PM PDT by Gomez
Microsoft is telling Windows users that they'll have to reinstall the operating system if they get infected with a new rootkit that hides in the machine's boot sector.
A new variant of a Trojan Microsoft calls "Popureb" digs so deeply into the system that the only way to eradicate it is to return Windows to its out-of-the-box configuration, Chun Feng, an engineer with the Microsoft Malware Protection Center (MMPC), said last week on the group's blog.
"If your system does get infected with Trojan:Win32/Popureb.E, we advise you to fix the MBR and then use a recovery CD to restore your system to a pre-infected state," said Feng.
A recovery disc returns Windows to its factory settings.
(Excerpt) Read more at computerworld.com ...
No. I prefer to browse the web by listening to a direct feed of raw IP traffic passed through a device that converts it to morse code.
“Hahahaha,,,it sure sounds like you have a “small man” syndrome complex there...”
Not at all, I just don’t like sub-par hardware that is obsolete already in PC’s and still over priced and pushed as cutting edge in an apple. The OS is not that impressive either. If it was so wonderful it would have been written to allow installation on PC based systems out of the box and MS would be a foot note.
huh? So you’re suggesting OSX wasn’t the first OS hacked in pwn2own competition 4 years in a row?
And that mac defender malware doesn’t exist? Nor that Apple tells their users to run a 3rd party AV product?
Not sure what’s so funny about that...other than the lies macbots spread about how OSX is the most secure OS and can’t get a virus/malware without user intervention and entering their password. Which btw is how most windows viruses get installed.
BTW what makes you think any of us have or want a Dell? I build my own and it is truly 10% the cost of a mac (well the closest performer that is usualy 1 to 2 years behind my parts.) Now my mom bought a Dell and it did come with a free monitor, dude.
“Wow you’re still using Windows XP! Impressive that an OS over 10 years old is still running strong today.”
I forgot the laptop with win2k. I have an automotive repair program on it that can’t be replaced. Its so old my grandma would recognize it and it runs like a swiss clock. I always liked nt4 too. Windows bad rap really comes from the 9x OS line and while well deserved was what 20 yrs ago.
+1 on VMWare being the way to go. Just emulate a machine inside your machine.
Odds are though, there is a native Linux application that would work just as well (if not better) as the one they want to run under windows.
If you save your data to an external hard drive - then go back to original factory - and reload from the external... will the bad stuff reload with the data?
If you save your data to an external hard drive - then go back to original factory - and reload from the external... will the bad stuff reload with the data?
Actually, my first thought of a $300 machine was something on sale from Best Buy but I figured I'd show a little respect.
Now my mom bought a Dell and it did come with a free monitor, dude.
Hey, I just used the pricing on Dell's website. If she got a computer & monitor from Dell for $300, good for her and if she's happy with it double good for her and if you haven't had to reinstall Windows to remove the rootkit triple good for her.
I buy parts here http://shop3.frys.com/template/computerspc and on Ebay. There is a local Frye store north of Indy, great prices. I haven’t reinstalled a Windows OS in a long time save when a hard drive replacement was needed. When Windows was based on the 9x platform it was crap but NT, 2k, XP and 7 are much better. My personal PC with WinXP is a funny critter. I used a recycled Compaq Presario case, Abit mobo, AMD dual core Athlon xp, Seagate HD’s sata raid 320 gb,N Vidia video (9800), 4gb of Kingston, and a Dell 22” monitor I bought from Craigs list in an unopened box for 100 bucks. The PC investment was less than 250.00. Now keep in mind its almost 3 years old. So go back 3 years and pick out the Mac with same specs and compare price. I have never had to reinstall anything on it, I have had 3 viruses I think but all were automaticly caught and removed by MS security essentials. I have a quad core amd PC that runs Suse, 500gb sata raid, N vidia GTX card, 4gb ram, total investment less than 400 bucks. Not only does Mac struggle (I say struggle to show respect) to compete with the hardware performance, software availability and dependabilty, but doesn’t even come close in price. A 400 dollar Mac is going to be slow, a 4 thousand dollar Mac might, might keep up but not likely. Mom’s Dell was 450 w monitor and printer I think. It has Win7 and it keeps itself pretty healthy. She could foul up WinXP on her old PC (also a Dell, single core Intel 2.8ghtz) about every 3 months due to too many 3rd party BS aps and little ram. So far the Win7 PC hasn’t needed anything from me and its about 9 months old now. Believe it or not that’s impressive if you know my mom and her PC’s. My beef with Macs are the proprietary nature of all Apple products. They have moved away from that a little on hardware but only because they would be out of the PC market by now if not. their hardware was so behind they had to move to PC parts. As bad as MS can be they are more open to 3rd party software than apple by far and MS’s openess to hardware is what makes your apple stuff anywhere near as fast as it is. The nature of apple is why its stuff is so much more expensive, the fact is Linux is on more computers than Mac os. Its not that I have a personal dog in the hunt I just know I can do better with my dollars than buy a Mac.
In fairness I must say Explorer is not my browser pick. For that I recomend Firefox. The good news is now that google is making an OS maybe we MS, Linux and Mac users can unite and pick on it for awhile.
Well I promise you won’t find me on any Mac threads.
I’m not worried — I use Linux.
It depends on the data you save, I guess, and whether it was infected before you saved it.
I'd tend to disagree at least a bit on this. OSX is a genuine certified Unix, with all the security that comes along with that. Yeah, it has a pretty shell on top that non-unix folk can pretty intuitively use (at least based on my fairly limited hands-on experience with it), but I see that as a pretty major benefit in that you get security and ease of use at the same time. My mother-in-law bought a Mac Mini, and has had very few things that she wanted to do that she couldn't figure out for herself.
I'm mostly Fedora at home, though I support AIX, Solaris, RedHat and Suse boxes at work. I've been forced to suffer through the MS-windows one size fits all shoehorn over the years, and must say that it really just doesn't suit me in any way, not to mention all the crap that people have to do to keep it from becoming a random spam generator for some Russian mobster.
OMG, are you really trying to equate an artificial situation like pwn2own with the real world? Wow. I think it is more useful to compare the real world where we see thousands of various viruses, trojans, and rootkits that are daily infecting users of MS-Windows daily. It's such a common occurance in the real world, that it's not even worth comment in the news anymore. With OSX, people were running around screaming like their hair was on fire because of a trojan that required active user intervention, to even be of any danger at all, and even then was pretty mild in comparison to the legions of malware out there daily making everyone miserable with the spam generated by Microsoft-based botnets.
I don't even use Mac hardware myself, but I appreciate those who do, because I know that at least they won't be sending me spam.
Of course you’d rather compare real world where the footprint of OSX is minimal. But in a contest where each OS has equal footing and equal opportunity to be targeted—no let’s not look at that.
OSX has avoided issues by being about as secure as Windows 7 and maintaining a small footprint on the world. However, as it grows so too will the hacks, malware, and viruses. As proven wiht the mac guard and defender malware.
I'm not criticizing your decision in the least or even arguing your point.
You have to remember though, that most of us don't want to build our own computers.
And most of us who are fans of Mac have had quite a bit of experience with Windows, which is why we are fans of Mac.
It's nice that microsoft has finally managed, with Windows 7 to come close to the security provided out of the box years ago with OSX (or Linux for that matter). However, we've still not seen a self-propagating worm/virus in the wild that can attack OSX without serious user intervention. The fact that there are users out there stupid enough to allow some random site to install software on their computer, and provide their administrator password to do so, and give authorization for it to run, is hardly the fault of any operating system. I don't blame microsoft when a user downloads something off the web then proceeds to blindly install and run it when the program goes rogue. On the other hand, there are numerous examples of people running multiple versions of windows getting pwned by software that was was installed and executed with no user intervention whatsoever, or because they clicked on the wrong link.
shoulda previewed. looks like I forgot to close a ‘bold’ tag.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.