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: a little ironic humor: Criminals try to 'copyright' malware
From: David Farber <dave () farber net>
Date: Sat, 3 May 2008 11:16:51 -0700
________________________________________ From: bobr () bobrosenberg phoenix az us [bobr () bobrosenberg phoenix az us] Sent: Saturday, May 03, 2008 11:36 AM To: David Farber Subject: a little ironic humor: Criminals try to 'copyright' malware Dave Yuh just gotta laugh! Cheers, Bob -- Bob Rosenberg P.O. Box 33023 Phoenix, AZ 85067-3023 Mobile: 602-206-2856 LandLine: 602-274-3012 bob () bobrosenberg phoenix az us ************** "Once a government is committed to the principle of silencing the voice of opposition, it has only one way to go, and that is down the path of increasingly repressive measures, until it becomes a source of terror to all its citizens and creates a country where everyone lives in fear." -- President Harry S. Truman, message to Congress, August 8, 1950 ************** Criminals try to 'copyright' malware Virus writers selling software with a detailed licensing agreement By Jordan Robertson The Associated Press updated 3:58 p.m. MT, Wed., April. 30, 2008 http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24394270/ SAN FRANCISCO - Even criminal hackers want to protect their intellectual property, and they've come up with a method akin to copyrighting — with an appropriate dash of Internet thuggery thrown in. Professional virus writers are now selling a suite of software on the Internet with an unusual attachment: a detailed licensing agreement that promises penalties for redistributing the malicious code without permission. "I just kind of chuckled — it's kind of humorous," said Zulfikar Ramzan, senior principal security researcher with Symantec Corp. Symantec researchers noticed a Russian-language example floating around the Internet and wrote about it on the company's official blog this week. They said it's the only example they've seen. The software is used to infect computers and control them remotely. The zombie machines can be used to pump out spam, launch more attacks or steal personal information from their owners. Networks of zombie machines — known as "bot nets" — can be extremely lucrative, sometimes bringing millions of dollars in profit for their authors and their distributors. To maximize that profit, the software analyzed by Symantec's researchers contained the following rules: # The customer can't resell the product, examine its underlying coding, use it to control other bot nets or submit it to antivirus companies and agrees to pay the seller a fee for product updates. # The threat: Violate the terms, and we'll report you ourselves to the antivirus companies by giving them information about how to dismantle your bot network or prevent it from growing bigger. While not legally binding, the terms amount to a novel way to protect ill-gotten profits — except that by ratting out their customers, malware authors risk drawing attention to their own enterprises and giving antivirus makers clues on combatting them. "We know they can't actually enforce it, and they probably wouldn't try," Ramzan said. "What's funny is they put more effort into their EULA (end-user license agreement) than traditional software companies might." The ultimate rub? Apparently the threat was not only hollow but unheeded. Symantec said the program that's accompanied by the novel rules is being traded freely online — and so far its authors haven't called Symantec to make good on their threat. Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24394270/ MSN Privacy . Legal © 2008 MSNBC.com ------------------------------------------- Archives: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/247/=now RSS Feed: http://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/247/ Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
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- : a little ironic humor: Criminals try to 'copyright' malware David Farber (May 03)