Microsoft report: Users responsible for half of all infections

This isn't hard for me to believe.

 

how about Secunia PSI ?

 

It's like blaming Ford for an accident happening and no airbags going off and the car was made out of cheap metal and the seats were filled with gasoline by-design and the tires were made of lubricated ice.

And then blaming the driver instead because "they should have been more careful."

 

Yes!!

I seem to remember a few years back successfully folks suing and winning compensation from mcdonalds for burning their mouths due to coffee and apple pies being hot. So people do blame manufacturs for their own ignorance and stupidity with the full support of the justice system! Crazy but true. Being dumb can reap financial rewards I guess

 

The McDonalds case is often sited but it sin't exactly how the media portrayed it.

The fact is that it IS on mcdonalds to label a cup of coffee as "hot."

 

As HungryMan suggests, there was a lot more to this case than what we all thought. The issue was that the coffee was heated excessively and served at a temperature that can cause 3rd degree burns within 2 seconds, and McDonalds had arrogantly ignored repeated official requests for them to lower the temperature. I thought the same as you until I looked into it myself.

 

Hello newbino,
it only covers a small amount of applications. with a windows app store all programs for windows could be available from it and be able to install and update all applications in one interface |(kinda like package management in linux). I hope windows 8 app store will support the ability to use windows live id or something else to sync some or all applications installed on one computer to another. apple already has a similar system with their app store on mac. btw the reason why I stated some applications or all is because some applications will be licensed for only one machine and somepeople use different machines for different purposes but have some applications they want on both.

 

You're becoming addicted to analogies. Remember about the variables, lol.

 

Couldn't agree more with you.

Windows is design in a way to make it "easier" and "friendly" so every person "can" use it. We have no console/terminal, you can install a program by just clicking 'next' for eg. How can they expect education from someone who barely knows what he's doing by clicking 'next'.

"Keep your AV updated and don't click on suspicious links". That's the most disgusting stuff I have to hear everyday. You already have to buy the OS, then you gotta waste money to cover it's flaws (ofc, theres free AV, etc).

Anyway, I'm not any specialist or anything, just my opnion as uses.

 

that is a completely flawed analogy. microsoft are doing alot to prevent malware from infecting their operating system and even taking down botnets.

do you really think if linux,OSX or BSD had the same market share the same wouldnt happern? People think mac/OSX is secure so they worry about malicious software of any form hence why the fake avs for OSX worked so well. it wouldnt be hard for criminals to make a fake av as a .deb file for ubuntu if it gained enough market share.
all operating systems are unsecure if an idiot has the root password. how many new linux users will type random commands they dont understand in to a root terminal?

remember android is based on linux and that has an increasing amount of malware because once again users dont think about malicious software on a smart phone. if a user finds what they think is a "cool app" are they going to think is this safe no they will just install it.

 

Wow, some of you are clearly from this new generation that harbors this sense of "entitlement", where no one is expected to take any responsibility for their actions or lack of actions; everything should be dome for you, you need to be hand-held through life because you can't think for yourselves, and when something goes wrong, it's the fault of someone else, in this case MS. Unbelieveable.

 

You're thinking of hippies I think.

Seriously though, I think a lot of users who get infected with malware, viruses & the like, or who are victims of identity theft et cetera, are genuinely just average end users who have little knowledge of the dangers out there in cyberspace. Most people think that if they have an antivirus program installed they are virtually safe as houses.

I personally think that MS are doing quite a lot when it comes to Internet security: Malware Protection Centre

 

The idea that the OS should be safe and the user should know nothing is already working in the corporate environment where the user does not have root.

If the user does not have root, and a virii etc finds its way onto your machine, it should be the responsibility of the OS or the software. If the user had to allow it, the blame resides on the user.

If the user has root, then the blame should be on the user. Whether you use UAC in a user account or use full blown admin, there is no way the OS can fully protect you. How are they supposed to do that when you have root? Impossible.

IMHO M$ has done a pretty good job of allowing complete idiots to have root while still maintaining some degree of security.

Bottom line is simple. If you want the dream of just being able to click without problems, make someone who knows something your admin and get stripped of root.

Sul.

 

LOL! Yeah, & there's that.

 

Nicely stated, Sully There is a definite distinction between a corporate environment and the home environment, where in the former case the responsibility for security is placed directly in the hands of the IT department, and at home it's largely the responsibility of the user to take what's available to them and put some basic effort into learning about and implementing what they've learned into securing their machines. What's so difficult about applying patches, an updated antivirus and running as a limited user, as well as exercising some common sense in what to download and install? All kinds of information is available at their fingertips just by Googleing. If people choose to ignore these type steps, it's their own fault they get pr0ned.

No, it's not a hippy problem. It's prevalent in society nowadays with the younger age group in particular. You see it in the news where the offender of a crime has more rights than the victim, because somehow it wasn't the fault of the offender for comitting the crime; rather it was the fault of their parents or society in general by not spoonfeeding them through life.

 

You can point the same finger towards Apple and Google, Android is a malware mess and OSX is also (slowly) beginning. The best solution against malware is to have a closed app system (app store) like Linux distro's (repositories) and other systems have.

 

They're hardly doing anything at all to prevent pirated versions of their software from being installed.

Even when Microsoft knows that a Win7 install is not genuine, it doesn't stop it. It just puts out a small "nag".

I can only speculate about the reasons for that.

 

I don't buy the 'young generation' argument. Many older people have very little knowledge of the dangers just surfing the Net. Many don't know what to do & panic when they experience some unexpected pop-up or something. I don't think you can just blame this on young hooligans &/or distorted perceived ontological constructions of the ills of youth culture & modern civilization. That's just lazy thinking. There are plenty of young responsible people as there are old irresponsible people.

You'd get on well with the Tories.

 

piracy is a different issue.
why are you linking the two? Are pirated versions more likely to get infected? not necessary. You cant obtain windows updates on pirated versions but you can secure the OS is other ways for example sandboxing,SRP and exploit protection in security suites.

 

@Daveski,

clearly we're not on the same page ...sigh.

 

My guess; not even the same book ...

 

Someone once gave me a copy of their MS Word & I loaded it & ran it for nearly a year before MS told me it was a crack. Eventually I just uninstalled it (I was using OpenOffice) but it got updated regularly until MS realised I was a pirate! I think it was the wooden leg & the parrot that really gave me away though.

 

You most certainly can update the OS when it's pirated.

 

1) I absolutely blame Apple and Android for any malware on their systems. Building a secure system is their job. Google's done a horrible job with it.

2) An app store is not enough.

 

Are you sure this reply really has anything to do with the entitlement wat0114 is talking about? I think he is not talking about whether young or old have problems and panic, but the more general sense that when you are irresponsible (no matter the age), you take the heat instead of passing the buck. In this case I think he is referring to the fact that if you blame the OS for panicking and hitting the "install" button, you are not putting the blame on the source of the problem.

One could say that if what HungryMan says it truth, that the OS should be responsible for creating absolute security, then M$ should just take away root completely. This way, it could be secure, you could click and click but never have a problem. Of course, you don't get to do what you want either, but at least you don't have to learn anything

Sul.