Alan, > and why are they still called "viruses"
Because most people don't know what the term 'virus' actually means in an IT context, and use it incorrectly to refer to security flaws, trojans, worms, diallers, backdoors, rootkits, spyware, adware and whatever else you're having. -------------------------------- If they were properly called "attacks" - which is any unwanted action taken on our equipment by an attacker - from the beginning, might they have gotten a different type of attention? I think so. A virus is something that occurs in nature, thus using the word virus for these things associates it with nature, as in "I caught a virus", which people are used to and tend to accept. Of course there is NOTHING about them that is natural and they aren't "caught" at all, they occur as a result of deliberate and destructive actions taken by evil people. But the "nature" association prevents people (to an important degree, I believe) from properly associating these actions with the evil people who perpetrate them, and consequently taking appropriate action to stop them. This as one of the Big Lies we live with that distort our perception of the world. Bill -- Alan Bourke alanpbourke (at) fastmail (dot) fm [excessive quoting removed by server] _______________________________________________ Post Messages to: [email protected] Subscription Maintenance: http://leafe.com/mailman/listinfo/profox OT-free version of this list: http://leafe.com/mailman/listinfo/profoxtech Searchable Archive: http://leafe.com/archives/search/profox This message: http://leafe.com/archives/byMID/profox/fa09945adbbc40a2bfba6137d7af7...@bills ** All postings, unless explicitly stated otherwise, are the opinions of the author, and do not constitute legal or medical advice. This statement is added to the messages for those lawyers who are too stupid to see the obvious.
