Full Disclosure mailing list archives

Re: Re: Help put a stop to incompetent computer forensics


From: "Donald J. Ankney" <dankney () sunsetfilms com>
Date: Wed, 10 Aug 2005 16:20:07 -0700

Wikipedia:

In the context of computer software, a Trojan horse is a malicious program that is disguised as legitimate software. The term is derived from the classical myth of the Trojan horse. In the siege of Troy, the Greeks left a large wooden horse outside the city. The Trojans were convinced that it was a gift, and moved the horse to a place within the city walls. It turned out that the horse was hollow, containing Greek soldiers who opened the city gates of Troy at night, making it possible for the Greek army to pillage the city. Trojan horse programs work in a similar way: they may look useful or interesting (or at the very least harmless) to an unsuspecting user, but are actually harmful when executed.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trojan_horse_%28computing%29

Your definition is just a subset of the standard, broader one.


On Aug 10, 2005, at 3:43 PM, Jason Coombs wrote:

foofus () foofus net wrote:

On Thu, Aug 11, 2005 at 12:26:23AM +0200, Thierry Zoller wrote:

The industry definition is perfectly within Homers defintion of a Trojan
horse.
JC> http://classics.mit.edu/Homer/iliad.html

When I read Homer, it was a Greek horse.



The horse became the property of the Trojans before it launched its hidden attack, but your point is interesting as well.

There are other terms used to describe malware disguised as something else that has hidden capability to cause damage. Logic bomb, for example.

I'll do some more work on this and see where it leads. The proposal of "backdoor" as the better term just doesn't work, since a backdoor is a hidden mechanism for gaining entry or control of a system that is built into the system by its creator or some other involved party. An intruder may open up a backdoor in a system by altering its programming rather than by planting a Trojan, so there needs to be a distinction between the two.

Cheers,

Jason Coombs
jasonc () science org
_______________________________________________
Full-Disclosure - We believe in it.
Charter: http://lists.grok.org.uk/full-disclosure-charter.html
Hosted and sponsored by Secunia - http://secunia.com/



_______________________________________________
Full-Disclosure - We believe in it.
Charter: http://lists.grok.org.uk/full-disclosure-charter.html
Hosted and sponsored by Secunia - http://secunia.com/

Current thread: