[Dorset] Next Meeting - Less than one week tonight
Hi All, I hope no-one went to the Meeting last night, because it's next week, as agreed on the list last month. I missed the reminder last night because of the unusual timing, so here it is a day late. The next Meeting is less than one week today at 8pm on 8th January. The venue is The Broadway and I expect to be there. See http://dorset.lug.org.uk/wiki/doku.php?id=meetings:pub#the_broadway Chris, Are you going? -- Terry Coles 64 bit computing with Kubuntu Linux -- Next meeting: Bournemouth, Tuesday, 2013-01-08 20:00 Meets, Mailing list, IRC, LinkedIn, ... http://dorset.lug.org.uk/ New thread on mailing list: mailto:dorset@mailman.lug.org.uk How to Report Bugs Effectively: http://goo.gl/4Xue
Re: [Dorset] Nexus 7 virus software, any problems?
On Tuesday 01 Jan 2013 19:29:51 Andrew R Paterson wrote: you state Certainly, on desktop Linux, there are far more virus signatures in the virus database than there are known viruses that attack Linux. Thats an interesting fact, pray where did you get it from? particularily the known viruses that attack linux bit. Andrew, I think you are being a little pedantic. When most people refer to viruses, they include Trojans, socially engineered malware and anything else that can generally break your machine. Similarly, virus scanners on Windows don't just scan for viruses; they look for all known malware and that is what the 'virus scanners on Android would appear to do. Google has its PLay Store just as Apple has its app store - there is no reason for one to be more vulnerable than the other. Natalie et al have already answered this one. I remember the days of Nobody got fired for buying IBM the hayday of FUD. Now it seems the AV producers are doing the same thing. You don't have to be a genius to realise that there would be no market for AV developers without viruses. True, but that doesn't stop the malware authors. I am still waiting for someone to detail a genuine UNIX (or LInux) virus as opposed to just being stupid and dowloading and running a script rm -rf /. I don't believe that the few genuine Linux/Unix 'viruses' (or malware items if you prefer) are that simple. In my original post, I did say that the only attack vector on Linux is probably social engineering, but since the average Android user is not a top-notch software engineer, they are likely to fall for this every time. I would hope that I wouldn't, but since I am also not a top- notch software engineer, I prefer to play it safe. Everyone gets fooled now and again. I agree about android running things as a single user, but there is a difference with malware and viruses. AV software can find viruses but malware is up to the user. See above. -- Terry Coles 64 bit computing with Kubuntu Linux -- Next meeting: Bournemouth, Tuesday, 2013-01-08 20:00 Meets, Mailing list, IRC, LinkedIn, ... http://dorset.lug.org.uk/ New thread on mailing list: mailto:dorset@mailman.lug.org.uk How to Report Bugs Effectively: http://goo.gl/4Xue
Re: [Dorset] Next Meeting - Less than one week tonight
On 02/01/13 18:23, Terry Coles wrote: Hi All, I hope no-one went to the Meeting last night, because it's next week, as agreed on the list last month. I missed the reminder last night because of the unusual timing, so here it is a day late. The next Meeting is less than one week today at 8pm on 8th January. The venue is The Broadway and I expect to be there. I expect to be there too. See http://dorset.lug.org.uk/wiki/doku.php?id=meetings:pub#the_broadway Chris, Are you going? -- Next meeting: Bournemouth, Tuesday, 2013-01-08 20:00 Meets, Mailing list, IRC, LinkedIn, ... http://dorset.lug.org.uk/ New thread on mailing list: mailto:dorset@mailman.lug.org.uk How to Report Bugs Effectively: http://goo.gl/4Xue
Re: [Dorset] Nexus 7 virus software, any problems?
On 02/01/13 18:36, Terry Coles wrote: On Tuesday 01 Jan 2013 19:29:51 Andrew R Paterson wrote: you state Certainly, on desktop Linux, there are far more virus signatures in the virus database than there are known viruses that attack Linux. Thats an interesting fact, pray where did you get it from? particularily the known viruses that attack linux bit. Andrew, I think you are being a little pedantic. When most people refer to viruses, they include Trojans, socially engineered malware and anything else that can generally break your machine. Similarly, virus scanners on Windows don't just scan for viruses; they look for all known malware and that is what the 'virus scanners on Android would appear to do. Google has its PLay Store just as Apple has its app store - there is no reason for one to be more vulnerable than the other. Natalie et al have already answered this one. I remember the days of Nobody got fired for buying IBM the hayday of FUD. Now it seems the AV producers are doing the same thing. You don't have to be a genius to realise that there would be no market for AV developers without viruses. True, but that doesn't stop the malware authors. I am still waiting for someone to detail a genuine UNIX (or LInux) virus as opposed to just being stupid and dowloading and running a script rm -rf /. I don't believe that the few genuine Linux/Unix 'viruses' (or malware items if you prefer) are that simple. In my original post, I did say that the only attack vector on Linux is probably social engineering, but since the average Android user is not a top-notch software engineer, they are likely to fall for this every time. I would hope that I wouldn't, but since I am also not a top- notch software engineer, I prefer to play it safe. Everyone gets fooled now and again. I agree about android running things as a single user, but there is a difference with malware and viruses. AV software can find viruses but malware is up to the user. See above. I didn't get a chance when my kids and consorts came back for New Year to find out which ones Android phone was responsible for the smurf attacks in my network. It is 4 x android, 0 x iphone and I know that three of them connect to my wireless network, not sure about the fourth. Looking after the grandchildren didn't allow me time to look at the router logs. Cheers, Peter -- Next meeting: Bournemouth, Tuesday, 2013-01-08 20:00 Meets, Mailing list, IRC, LinkedIn, ... http://dorset.lug.org.uk/ New thread on mailing list: mailto:dorset@mailman.lug.org.uk How to Report Bugs Effectively: http://goo.gl/4Xue
Re: [Dorset] Nexus 7 virus software, any problems?
Terry, as I give up preaching to the unconvertible, consider my last parting shot carefully... This medium is supposed to be a LUG, The difference between virusen and malware is no more pedantic than whether I achieve my computing aims using Linux or Windows or ios. This difference is what steve jobs recognised and trapped his user base into limiting the spread of malware very successfully. Google with its Play Store is commendably attempting the same thing. Regards Andy On Wednesday 02 January 2013 18:36:58 Terry Coles wrote: On Tuesday 01 Jan 2013 19:29:51 Andrew R Paterson wrote: you state Certainly, on desktop Linux, there are far more virus signatures in the virus database than there are known viruses that attack Linux. Thats an interesting fact, pray where did you get it from? particularily the known viruses that attack linux bit. Andrew, I think you are being a little pedantic. When most people refer to viruses, they include Trojans, socially engineered malware and anything else that can generally break your machine. Similarly, virus scanners on Windows don't just scan for viruses; they look for all known malware and that is what the 'virus scanners on Android would appear to do. Google has its PLay Store just as Apple has its app store - there is no reason for one to be more vulnerable than the other. Natalie et al have already answered this one. I remember the days of Nobody got fired for buying IBM the hayday of FUD. Now it seems the AV producers are doing the same thing. You don't have to be a genius to realise that there would be no market for AV developers without viruses. True, but that doesn't stop the malware authors. I am still waiting for someone to detail a genuine UNIX (or LInux) virus as opposed to just being stupid and dowloading and running a script rm -rf /. I don't believe that the few genuine Linux/Unix 'viruses' (or malware items if you prefer) are that simple. In my original post, I did say that the only attack vector on Linux is probably social engineering, but since the average Android user is not a top-notch software engineer, they are likely to fall for this every time. I would hope that I wouldn't, but since I am also not a top- notch software engineer, I prefer to play it safe. Everyone gets fooled now and again. I agree about android running things as a single user, but there is a difference with malware and viruses. AV software can find viruses but malware is up to the user. See above. -- Next meeting: Bournemouth, Tuesday, 2013-01-08 20:00 Meets, Mailing list, IRC, LinkedIn, ... http://dorset.lug.org.uk/ New thread on mailing list: mailto:dorset@mailman.lug.org.uk How to Report Bugs Effectively: http://goo.gl/4Xue
