>
> Benjamin J. Weiss said:
>
> > Wow, Hal, guess've just slept the last year or so. Ever heard of
> > Slapper? At one point it had infected at least 13,000 distinct machines:
>
> I've missed most of this thread, but it seemed to me that the point is
> that viruses don't spread on Linux via e-mail/attachments, the way that,
> say, Klez or Blaster do. The mechanism of Slapper's spread (and the very
> few other worms that infect Linux/Unix hosts) is very, very different.
> Outlook is built to support the spread of worms and viruses, but there is
> no equivalent function in Linux -- unless it's supported by a heavy dose
> of social engineering ("I promise, when you save this attachment and
> change its permissions to executable and log in a root and run this
> program, it'll be really really cool! I promise!"). :)
>
> Having said that, it's a good idea to have at least *some* degree of virus
> protection on your *nix system. Most infections have to be cleaned out by
> hand, but if you run a mail server (or even a little mailhost in your
> house like I do), it can be a startlingly good idea to put some sort of
> virus protection tool on it, if only to prevent any viruses from spreading
> among your networked computers that are infected with Outlook -- er, I
> mean, with worms.
My argument wasn't the method of propagation or the difference between a
virus and a worm. My response was to his assertion that you didn't need
"virus" protection on a linux machine.
In my experience, complacency leads inevitably to disaster.
Ben
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