HACKED

[Big Lou]

I used and really liked Firefox for a number of years the for some reason difficulties occurred. That's when I switched to Chrome. Have avoided IE for decades.

 

[j.w]

It's on the radio news here right now today too and they said the gov't here is advising all this now. They said they have known about the bug for years but activity is now being shown involving this bug.

Here is the date if you don't believe me then go online or whatever. It is true according to the U.S Dept of Homeland security.

The U.S. Department of Homeland security is advising Americans not to use the Internet Explorer Web browser until a fix is found for a serious security flaw that came to light over the weekend. VPC

Elizabeth Weise, USATODAY 3:58 p.m. EDT April 29, 2014

(Photo: Microsoft)

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SAN FRANCISCO — The U.S. Department of Homeland security is advising Americans not to use the Internet Explorer Web browser until a fix is found for a serious security flaw that came to light over the weekend.

 

[HARO]

On MY callendar, May 14 is a Wednesday!
John

 

[morewater]

Haro, we're in Canada. Our calendar is metric.

Get with the program, dude.

 

[HARO]

Oh, I keep forgetting..... ten days in a month, ten hours in a day, 100 minutes in an hour... !!
John

 

[morewater]

Don't forget the exchange rate.

 

[Big Lou]

I believe.........

 

[HARO]

I believe.........

you are all nuts!

 

[Big Lou]

Pecans, peanuts or pistachios?

 

[Big Lou]

Into the high mountains went Bill Gates. On the179th day he tumbled back down with IE!

 

[Waterbug]

The U.S. Department of Homeland security is advising Americans not to use the Internet Explorer Web browser until a fix is found for a serious security flaw that came to light over the weekend. VPC

Must be true if it's in USA Today or on the local radio.

Or you could actually read word for word what the government actually said. It's probably shorter than the "news" report. I posted the link earlier but it's so short I'll post the actual text here in its entirety.

US-CERT is aware of active exploitation of a use-after-free vulnerability in Microsoft Internet Explorer. This vulnerability affects IE versions 6 through 11 and could allow unauthorized remote code execution.

US-CERT recommends that users and administrators review Microsoft Security Advisory 2963983 for mitigation actions and workarounds. Those who cannot follow Microsoft's recommendations, such as Windows XP users, may consider employing an alternate browser.

For more details, please see VU#222929.

In the worst possible case, if all the posted solutions don't work, the government advised people "may consider employing an alternate browser". I realize English is a second language to Americans but there actually is a difference between that and...

Don't use IE: Government issues major warning over Internet Explorer bug and says hackers are ALREADY exploiting it

or that the government is telling people to not use IE.

BTW, the same government department issued the same type of alert for Firefox the very next day saying there were new fixes to Firefox vulnerabilities. So if you haven't installed those you're just as at risk as IE users. And guess what...next month there will be more fixes to Firefox, Chrome, IE, and many other things to fix vulnerabilities they all have today.

And on the very same day issued the same type of alert for Adobe Flash which you may not even know you're using...but I bet you are.

So I guess, using Chicken Little logic, everyone should consider employing an alternate browser, like no browser.

I love when all these news stories say things like "it came to light over the weekend" meaning the reporter read the story probably right here in this thread. Too funny. It's not news, it's story telling. It's giving back to you the same info you're telling the "news source". It's what news is today, telling you what you want to hear.

But if people want to believe the sky is falling then enjoy. I think that's a hoot.

Side note just for fun...A long time ago I and a couple of partners started a company called "WalkSoftly" where I wrote an app that detected evil software that would install into your system and watch key strokes. That way the evil software could steal passwords. Scary? You betcha.

Was there any software actually doing that evil stuff? Nope. Why not? It sure isn't hard to do. I could write such an app in a couple of hours and insert it into a bunch of free apps people download from less than perfect sites, or email it to a few thousand people who some would open it and by this afternoon I probably could have lots of passwords and the places to use them. So why aren't hackers doing that? Because the problem isn't in the taking it's in the using. How much money could I actually steal vs risk of going to jail forever or having a drone visit me? It isn't worth it.

The real money is in selling the fix. I created a demo that stole a password from an investor (with their advanced understanding and agreement) and boom instant funding (well, not exactly instant). But that's the sell. WalkSoftly later merged with another company and was sold to Network Solutions for I think $119 million (of which I got less than $10K but that's another story).

There are 3 arms to software security.
1. Evil people doing evil things.
2. Good people making software safer.
3. People making money scaring people which is not only perfectly legal but a cornerstone of our economy.

The days of scary software getting onto your computer are largely over. Not because software is safer but mainly because hackers have much more interesting things to do. There is probably software already on your computer that you didn't authorize doing things you probably wouldn't like if you knew about it. But to survive it has to keep its head down. If it does anything to actually harm you in any meaningful way it will be discovered very fast and destroyed. This has really been true for a long time. Back in the day most harmful software did damage by mistake, it was dumb. Today these kinds of software are written by professionals who understand how to do it so you never ever notice.

The company that found this IE scare...there are lots of companies that look for holes. They get no money (in most cases) for finding the hole. They do it to get press in order to get business for doing other security related things. To get press they go to a lot of effort to convince some crap news web site to write a story. Then they send that story to other crap news sources and so on until hopefully the story goes viral. Most of the time these stories don't get to the mass media level and are just in the security circles, but sometimes they do.

 

[Dave 54]

Oh the mention of your Homeland security really gets my back up . I'm sorry but they really do Bush was on a winner that sad day he basicaly stole your civil rights.....
Personally I think your homeland security has too much power and that after 9/11 you gave your freedom to free speach etc away when that happened....... they stopped a 13 year old diabetic child and his Dad my best friend who is ex military from entering because the child had lost his pasport in Spain then after it being reported missing found it again and imformed the Authorities that it in all events had not been outside of their hotel room but they wouldnt have any of that his pasport flagged up and he was taken into custody .
The reason for Rob and his Sons visit to texas was to meet with Robs sister-in- law and the boy his aunt , the reason homeland security gave was well the boy may be a terrorist "I MEAN COME ON WHAT ARE THEY EMPLOYING MORONS IN HOMLAND SECURITY".
They were going to send the boy out on the next available flight "tired and type one diabetic who was just about washed out by the flight from the UK, on his own would probably have lapsed into a diabetic coma and maybe died on the filght home whilst Rob could enter your country.
At this Rob went ballistic at this jobsworth/ little Hitler risking arrest by them infact they told him they would if he didnt curb his anger I ask you what would you had done if he was your boy you would react the same wouldnt you.
And the bit that hurt the most the fact that Rob had served alongside your guys in Iraq ,I visited your country on six occiasions and was never treated like that we were welcomed with open arms, "Well tht my next visit to your beautiful country gone the gestapo will be waiting for me should I visit for bad mouthing them online it makes me so angry they could treat a child like that

Dave

 

[j.w]

Firefox, Thunderbird, and Adobe flash all updated on my computer. Not using IE and haven't been of my choice for years. Use what I want for Malware, virus protection etc. and keep it all updated. If they weren't telling us all this stuff about scams, security flaws, bugs, virus's and whatever there would be people saying the gov't is hiding things from us. I'm not one for trusting whatever our gov't tells me but if this is just an easy fix through keeping things updated and safe then what's the big deal? I do all this anyway. Just passing the info on to others and they can decide what they like and choose to do. If you would like to keep posting all the reasons on why we should just ignore it all then go ahead. Let them that wish to ignore it all do so. Go ahead use IE and don't do the updates and maybe nothing will happen or maybe it will.............who knows. I didn't invent this all. No use continuing the conversation anymore as far as I'm concerned cuz "The Truth is Out There"

 

[Waterbug]

Oh the mention of your Homeland security really gets my back up . I'm sorry but they really do Bush was on a winner that sad day he basicaly stole your civil rights.....

That is 100% wrong. No one stole our rights. We gave them up willingly.

 

[Waterbug]

Just passing the info on to others and they can decide what they like and choose to do.

Just discussing the message, not the messenger.