Re: Re: E-Mail viruses

[Valdis.Kletnieks () vt edu]

On Sat, 06 Mar 2004 01:47:13 +0100, starwars said:
> For security reasons, the upgrade installer has been renamed to update.eex 
> and cannot be executed directly. [insert "this tremendously elegant 
> solution keeps you safe from viruses, because..." here].

On Sat, 06 Mar 2004 17:54:55 +1300, Nick FitzGerald <nick () virus-l demon co uk>  said:
> Yes, but to get through to Kurt's users, the malware (or its sender) 
> has to guess (or know if it is a directed or insider attack, in which 
> case "protection" is fundamentally harder anyway) the "right" 
> extension.  Limiting ourselves to three-character-only, non-case 
> sensitive ASCII alphanumerics, that is a one in 3^36 chance.  Anything 
> else will be stopped as "unwanted", so a virus trying to "fake out" 
> this approach still won't get to the users behind a perimeter  
> filtering mechanism enforcing this kind of policy...

It's not 3^36, which is multiple billions, it's only 36^3, which is 46,656.

And only one has to get through to an idiot.

Anybody else got a mail server that blocked more than that many Netsky's
this weekend alone?  Draw the obvious conclusion here...

And *that* was why I was dubious as to the real usefulness...

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