Comments on: FAQ: Conficker time bomb ticks, but don't expect boom

Worm's latest variant is set to start hitting random domains on April 1. But security experts say the damage might not be as serious as the hype suggests.

[danielj1987]

Personally, I'm a linux fan. I am sitting on an Ubuntu right now and am glad to say, I don't have nearly as many of the problems with a computer I used to. I just do all the updates, install what I need, browse where I want, and enjoy. I have a spare hard drive I play with XP and do what I want there, and, if it gets infected, no loss, just reformat, reinstall xp, reinstall the games, and continue. oh, what a joy it is. and by the way, I agree about the market share. if i were to write a virus, i'd go for the biggest hit. according to one study, i'll provide the link below, 89.2% windows, 4% linux, 6% mac, and that leaves... 0.8% other. I'd write for windows. big hit, big market share, and make a huge impact. besides, the file organization on linux is way diff from windows. not even a C: unless you have wine or a virtual machine installed

http://www.w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_os.asp

[tipoo_]

I despise people who make viruses and worms, but i gotta admit, this looks promising ;-)

[ccjinx06]

1. I have Linux and don't need to worry about this
2. Mac and Linux are not virus-proof, it just makes sense to make a virus for the most widely-used OS out there, the makers of viruses aren't out to get thousands of people, they're out to get millions.
3. I have no idea how Microsoft stays in business

[pagewise]

MicroS--t stays in business because most people don't know any better

[inachu1]

the past 2 symantec conflicker tool remoers do not work now as the code base has changed several times. Bes thing to do is stop visiting the site you think you got it from and also stop using your USB keychain and format it also.

[tipoo_]

If i was the person/group responsible for this, and i had 10 million PC's worth of computational power at my disposal, i would make them all work in a folding at home team ;-)

what can you do?

buy a mac....

[hellomad]

i guess this has been debated since the first worm/computer virus/malware has been detected and has been said numerous times over and over and over and again, and yet this is like a debate with the same question, "how many sides does a circle have?" well those who know the obvious answer will say something and those who dont will say something else. thus? we are in a dubious state. as an average joe user? they completely depend on what others say or spoken. and we often forget internet security is a theory and ideas and common best practices and ideologies and SECURITY IS NOT A BLACKBOX DEVICE. so i really dont understand as why is there so much fuss. worse? be it windows or linux or bsd, nothing is safe, and thats why i always have this paranoia of insecurity. so the idea being nobody knows absolutely about everything? i heavily depend on the DO's and DONT's and STRICTLY DONT's published in websites. considering the fact the modern IT is nothing but an adult entertainment (be it porno or non porno i.e. social networking sites) the user has no friggin clue whats happening and what to do? they always rely and he say, she say and they say kind of info they get, install 100000000 antivirus and that too from pirated sites. and all. and continue thinking they are safe. worst? Microsoft (C) (R) (TM)gives away indepth security programs and features and tools available to all legit customers, and then again there are too many pirated software users, who likes to see the COOL interface, who likes to use the mouse than command line. thinking they are not lazy using mouse, where mouse usage makes you work more than typing a few bunch of commands. in unix (R) (C) (TM) and linux (r) (c) and bsd (c) (r) also we have equal issues, unless its properly configured? every other time invested highly thought upon issues are nothing but a mare waste of time arguing. and here i go again like a mad moron monkey arguing, that its irrespective of OS and Softwares? we are still vulnerable and insecure and all we need to do is use common sense and a few regulated guidelines. which we dont? and we end up posting numerous lines.
the classic math problem "whats the answer, when you divide something by 0?" there are infinite possibilities, so? dont speculate, just follow the best practices listed in the OS website and follow them (not blindly but use common sense, if common sense is absent, ask someone who has a little of common sense than jumping into a well of fire. period), be it any OS; MS, Linux, BSD, UNIX, et al. all follow same logic of operation. sheesh. here i have given and wasted another 5 mins of my time trying to figure the perfect answer of 1 divided by 0. give up others and myself giving up, since this debate will continue till end of human race, as whose ASS is bigger.
paul, a mad moron.

[hellomad]

p.s. mac fan boys out there. i got a legit copy of mac os x and never installed it, i purchased it tho. and second if you are a real IT chap? and did some research? then you will/must know? MAC is based on BSD's kernel and sometime mach kernel BSD's micro arch. so those who say mac makes you in safe heaven? please commit suicide and die and go to heaven and have a glass with Mac Dowell or other Mac alcohol and get drunk and make Mac merry with the angels in heaven. good bye. apart from those supporting those antivirus project? those supporting MAC are absolutely garbage. and to make matters worse? i got 20 friends who work in symantec in india, as i am an indian and a linux chap? they ask us how to detect and how to dissect using reverse coding and et al. so? i can happily rubbish claims from from all claimers of perfect IT secure world. and let me ask you how will you defend against alternate data streams in windows via symantec i have seen only kaspersky work, but not work well/smooth against ADS attack, and also how about rootkits? and opensource keyloggers and also those who are hardcore IT guys they never depend on products which claims too much aka boasts. we just simply defeat them in the first place avoiding a conflict. if you know programming? then you can beat their defensive mechanism just at the time when some anti-attack system is implemented. so? please keep continuing the flame wars as mac vs pc and windows vs mac osx vs linux vs bsd vs beos. why now get the source code from MS source share program and design the way windows must behave and way you like, or bsd's/linux's source and make your own BSD/Linux from scratch, people been doing this and doing till date and will continue to do so? whats stopping you than post here starting something which is senseless? huh!

[TimC7]

I'm no virus expert, but I was reluctantly enlisted to help an old friend who's a starving grad student with malware problems on her Compaq laptop (she ran out of friends to help undo the bugs she kept getting). Even with quality protection that was updated daily, it seemed that her 13 year old (or the kid's friends) managed to screw things up on a regular basis. The last time stumped me and tech support, so I paid $50 to have the laptop disinfected (she was desperate with final papers due).

After all that grief, someone suggested she buy a cheap used mac laptop to connect to the web. Now the teenager uses the pc for homework, games and dvds - no web - we even turned off the wireless so she can't get on if she wanted to. The mac gets used for all web and mail (and grad studies homework). Two months later, not a single problem. I don't know who's happier, me or her.

She said it's the same feeling she got when she moved to an apartment with a garage, so she didn't have to park her car on the street where it was broken into on a regular basis - I'd call that the feeling of security. I'm just glad she figured it out.

[gpluvr]

How about giving people something to detect this thing with such as Sophos Conficker detection: https://secure.sophos.com/products/free-tools/conficker-removal-tool/download

[linuxgeek90]

PC IZ TRASH. MAC IS EXPENSIVE. LINUX RULEZ.

lol

[rlloydduff]

I quit using Windows a couple of years ago and so far have had no viruses. I have a firewall and virus protection but I want to know if Linux is safe from this worm? Thanks - BOB -

[jpconti65]

I am still running Windows 98SE. Is there a security patch in existence for this system? Is this system effected by this conficker virus? Please advise. thanks

[timsdeepsky]

Me and my friend Ubuntu,,believe you reap what you sow....Long live virus free Linux....