Re: 'we should all be uncomfortable with the extent to which luck..'

[Chris Rapier <rapier () psc edu>]

> >       This assault also demonstrates that machines operated by home
> >       users or small businesses (hosts less likely to be maintained
> >       by a professional sysadmin) are integral to the robustness of
> >         the global Internet. As is the case with biologically active
>
> Do you always let your stereotyping lead you by the nose like this ...? Home
> users ... maybe. Small businesses ... not.

I think your faith in mankind is sorely misplaced on this issue. Small
businesses are no more likely to be well maintained than many home
systems. There is little to no motivation for the majority of small
businesses to have an on staff IT professional. Most simply have a
person who is slightly more knowledgable than the other people there.
This isn't because they are ignorant but because the cost/benefit
analysis doesn't indicate that one is really worthwhile. 

One might say that any place which has a webserver or telnet server or
whatever should be large enough to afford an IT person. Except that
ignores the fact that several OSes install things like this
automagically or at least with great ease. I suppose much of this also
depends on what you consider to be a small business though. 

I am only speaking from experience both as a consultant to small
businesses and having worked for several in my life. 

> > Systems Affected
> >
> >    Systems running versions of telnetd derived from BSD source.
>
> How many of us here run anything less than SSH and even allow telnetd to
> live on any of our hosts?

Here? Probably not all that many. In the real world? Probably the
majority (at least up until recently).