On Wed, 5 Dec 2001, Ken Ambrose wrote: > - Always, relentlessly, drive into your users' heads that they must be > cautious and vigilent in opening attachments, no matter how innocuous > they appear.
Your average corporate user's head is more dense then Neutronium. User education will not solve this problem everywhere. Furthermore, what about all the home users out there? As far as the other defenses you mention go, I note most of them are reactive, i.e., they all start with, "After the virus is discovered...". What if you are one of those unlucky ones to get hit before the virus is discovered by the community? > - Immediately, and without hesitation, zap that damn "feature" in > Winblows wherein file extensions are hidden from the user, thus making > something like pieBillGates.MPG.scr look like pieBillGates.MPG. Except that some extensions are still hid, always, and various Microsoft programs (including parts of Windows) turn it back on again, as can the users, and, well, in general, this is just way harder than it needs to be. Microsoft does not design their software with security in mind. Their decision to not allow any .EXE attachments in Outlook 2002 only emphasizes this. If their software was, in general, secure, it would not be a problem. The .EXE blocking thing attempts to solve the problem by bypassing it, but the fundamental problem is still there: Microsoft software is not designed with security in mind. Until/unless that changes, the problem will remain. > Viruses suck, but they're a fact of life for the modern sysadmin. Not in an all-Unix shop. ;-) -- Ben Scott <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> | The opinions expressed in this message are those of the author and do not | | necessarily represent the views or policy of any other person, entity or | | organization. All information is provided without warranty of any kind. | ***************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the text 'unsubscribe gnhlug' in the message body. *****************************************************************
