backdoor.rustock virus (trojan)

[Guest Lester Weevils]

Here's the latest VB100.  The higher and to the right the program is, the better it is:

 

 

Thanks for posting that, Sam1

 

Dunno why, but it is surprising that AVG and Microsoft Security Essentials score so near the top of the pack. Not that either product seemed shoddy when I used them. Just surprising they work that well.

 

Are my eyes too weak, or are Norton and McAfee not even in this chart? I don't like either product anyway, they take over the machine too much and are too naggy. Many new PC's I've bought for myself and others came with McAfee installed, and the first task before even connecting to the internet were to remove McAfee along with all the other included bloatware. Old dad has comcast and was using the norton they give away free, but it started misbehaving on his puters so I wiped it and replaced with MSE. Problems went away.

[Sam1]

Neither of them are on the chart, they used to score lower than the majority of free programs.  After a few complete misses, I don't think they even give Symantec a legit review anymore.

 

Wanted to edit this, it looks like Symantec doesn't do too bad on the charts, not sure why they stopped listing them.  Program is still such a resource hog that I wouldn't put on my enemy's computers.

Edited October 20, 2013 by Sam1

[deadeye111]

The Symantec 2013 360 that I am using on my desktop and laptops isn't the resource hog that the older programs were has been my experience. I was using AVG and the free stuff along with Zonealarm Security Suite at different times but I switched to Norton last year around Black Friday. It was free after rebate and has worked to my satisfaction and I have had computers for years. I agree with the older programs being resource hogs and hard to uninstall without Symantec's uninstall program to clean most traces.

[Guest Lester Weevils]

Many moons ago symantec made some great products. At one time it was almost essential to me to have norton tools for the various file utilities, and ghost was a fabulous disk imager, but about the era of XP they seemed to abandon most of those thangs that were so useful to me. So its good to hear maybe they are making a comeback.

At one time symantec also made some of the best compilers for mac and pc, but then when they started getting some serious competition seemed to just fold shop and first quit updating, then later quit selling the programming tools. OTOH, it may have been a money thang. Maybe at that time even at several hundred bucks per compiler there weren't enough developers to make any money in that market. Metrowerks codewarrior took over for some years after symantec bowed out, which was also a great IDE, and Metrowerks never made much money no matter that so many successful companies depended on the compiler for their software. Eventually only kept alive as a private pet IDE for customers to program motorola embedded systems. Dunno if they are still around.

[Sam1]

Yeah, Symantec was one of the best but then they started installing so much bloatware it would kill a system. I think they started going downhill around '03-'04 when they were focusing on working with the manufacturers and trying to figure out ways to keep people from uninstalling their junk.

[Guest TankerHC]

I have yet to find any Antivirus that catches everything. I have so much redundant security on my computers it isnt funny, yet I still have to manually catch certain things. In almost all my time on computers I only ever got two real viruses. The first one was stoned, pre web and the second one was not that long ago, Sasser which required a seperate download from Microsoft (And other vendors) to remove it. But the last few years more and more are coming along. New ones come every second, most do no harm and some do nothing at all except reside. Couple of years ago I got a replicator which did physical damage.

 

Only real solution, dont use a computer, which is no solution.

Edited October 22, 2013 by TankerHC

[rugerla1]

Just an update: I know I didn't contribute much to this conversation as y'all were using a language I don't understand, but my IT guy at work got the laptop going again. Apparently it was pretty bad, whatever it was that got in here. He basically rebuilt it from the ground up and it's working like a champ. He recommended Avast! AV and put it on for me. In the meantime my wife decided she's buying a new computer anyway, and told me this laptop is my Christmas present.....that means I pay for the repair lmao. Anyway, I'm happy to get it regardless. Thanks for all the info guys!

[Guest TankerHC]

Get a Mac , quit paying for anti anything software !

The money is up front , but no annual fees for annual software.

 

I hear this all the time. Macs DO get viruses, and have for years. The reason Macs have that reputation is not because they DO NOT get viruses, but Apple only holds 10% of the desktop and laptop Market, MS holds 90% globally and nearly 100% of the business market (Which is why they will be supporting XP for another 12 years on the business end). It isnt any harder to attack the MAC OS than it is to attack the MS OS's. The reason the MS OS's are attacked so frequently has been well known for years, because its easier to attack the OS's that control 90% of the market, more profitable and MORE FUN for the jackasses that do it.

 

Ever heard of Honk Kong? Its an replicator trojan that wiped out tons of Macs in the 90's. Ever heard of Apple Script? Another Trojan that opened a back door and allowed hackers to take control of and steal user data.. 

 

Hell rts? Another backdoor Mac virus that allows hackers to steal data.

 

The only reason Macs are not hacked as much is because there are few of them, Viruses have become big business, and it isnt worth the time to infect 10% of the worlds computers when you can do 90% at once. As Macs OS's become more prevalent (Because just like Win 8 (or visa versa) Mac OS is a cross platform OS it will begin showing up on more and more devices, not speaking of cell phones, more tablets than just the iPad, more netbooks, more everything, more portabe computer designs, atacks on the Mac OS will increase, right now it is just not worth it for hackers. 

[Guest TankerHC]

Thanks for posting that, Sam1

 

Dunno why, but it is surprising that AVG and Microsoft Security Essentials score so near the top of the pack. Not that either product seemed shoddy when I used them. Just surprising they work that well.

 

Are my eyes too weak, or are Norton and McAfee not even in this chart? I don't like either product anyway, they take over the machine too much and are too naggy. Many new PC's I've bought for myself and others came with McAfee installed, and the first task before even connecting to the internet were to remove McAfee along with all the other included bloatware. Old dad has comcast and was using the norton they give away free, but it started misbehaving on his puters so I wiped it and replaced with MSE. Problems went away.

 

I have 3 different AVG;s and have tried most of them. I dont think the 100 that Lester posted is as accurate as they claim,. (Not lester, it is what it is). For one thing in the Industry AVG Pro is known for being very slow or last in updating their definitions. They are always in the top 10 when a new ver comes out, but usually near the bottom in real testing. I have AVG Pro and do not use it. It didnt get the job done. Bitdefenders big sell is the number of tools in the software, but still doesnt compare to what you get from Wisecare for $5. Or Wisecare for free for that matter. So far the best option f(For me) is layered protection and the best AV has actually turned out to be one I have ignored for years that isnt even on the list (Or I missed it), Trend Micro Titanium, used in conjunction with Kaspersky Money, Wisecare 365 Pro and MWB Pro. 1 issue in probably 10 years. 

 

I use and always have layers,. An anti malware, anti virus, and threat detection on daily cleanup as well as financial protection on transactions. The only time anything get through is if I do something dumb enough to let it, like last week, which I was able to take care of thankfully with a bunch of changes to H_key's and removing it piece by piece after shutting down my connection, took 3 days to screw with that and manually find everything. But I can count on one hand and have fingers left the number of viruses that have got through in the last 15 or 20 years. . 

 

But there is one thing that cost me. I use vBulletin on my Forums, except one, a Genealogy Forum, on that Forum I WAS using phpbulletin, the forum had probably 40,000 photos, quite a few posts, documents etc and while I was on vacation and not paying attention, bots started exploiting an opening, got a call from ipage (Its on a shared server) that they had to shut down the account, they opened it up for 24 hours so I could clean it up because it was slowing down their server and reaching overload (150,000 hits per 15 minutes, so it was shutting down every 15 for 5), and when I looked, not paying attention I had 190,000 fake accounts and more coming. The only way to do it was individually so I ended up deleting the databases. Sucked but I learned my lesson, no phpbulletin. 

[JohnC]

I hear this all the time. Macs DO get viruses, and have for years.

What do you think of Ubuntu Linux as far as viruses go? I've never heard of Ubuntu Linux getting a virus. None of my Linux PC's have a firewall or anti-virus. Well, my router has a hardware firewall.

I have 3 old desktops that ran XP and XP Media as well as an old XP laptop.

They all got so slow and crappy that I wiped one clean and installed Linux and the others I run Linux as a dual operating system mainly because I have so many files and photos of the XP side that I didn't want to wipe them clean.

Anyway, Ubuntu Linux with Google Chrome makes these old PC's feel as quick as at least a Windows 7 PC right now.

[Guest TankerHC]

What do you think of Ubuntu Linux as far as viruses go? I've never heard of Ubuntu Linux getting a virus. None of my Linux PC's have a firewall or anti-virus. Well, my router has a hardware firewall.

I have 3 old desktops that ran XP and XP Media as well as an old XP laptop.

They all got so slow and crappy that I wiped one clean and installed Linux and the others I run Linux as a dual operating system mainly because I have so many files and photos of the XP side that I didn't want to wipe them clean.

Anyway, Ubuntu Linux with Google Chrome makes these old PC's feel as quick as at least a Windows 7 PC right now.

 

Having researched that, because I was not up on Linux, I had seen that the reason Linux naturally gets no viruses is because there are no open ports. But still not 100% secure, since the user can still bring them in with malicious software, I had seen a list of I know 50 viruses that had infected Ubuntu over the last several years, but easy to get rid of, the problem was that if you work on files with Windows users, your secure, but you can pass on those viruses. From all "appearances", there is no OS safer than any of the Linux OS's. 

 

I have a fairly high end desktop I finished building about a month ago, I have 2 "8" licenses, but seriously considering giving Ubuntu a try. One of the problems I see is driver support, hardware improvements move fast, I do not think there are drivers for half my hardware that would work on a Linux system. Going to see I think and may do it this week. Back in the early 80's I worked on Unix machines (Operator) and thats about as much interest as I have had with anything even close to Linux. But Computer Forum members and everyone I know who uses it, having used MS-DOS (And other DOS) Mac iOS and Windows all swear by Linux. Still have other machines for what they need to do, but swear that Linux is the way to go. Ill see when I start using it. 

[JohnC]

Having researched that, because I was not up on Linux, I had seen that the reason Linux naturally gets no viruses is because there are no open ports. But still not 100% secure, since the user can still bring them in with malicious software, I had seen a list of I know 50 viruses that had infected Ubuntu over the last several years, but easy to get rid of, the problem was that if you work on files with Windows users, your secure, but you can pass on those viruses. From all "appearances", there is no OS safer than any of the Linux OS's. 
 
I have a fairly high end desktop I finished building about a month ago, I have 2 "8" licenses, but seriously considering giving Ubuntu a try. One of the problems I see is driver support, hardware improvements move fast, I do not think there are drivers for half my hardware that would work on a Linux system. Going to see I think and may do it this week. Back in the early 80's I worked on Unix machines (Operator) and thats about as much interest as I have had with anything even close to Linux. But Computer Forum members and everyone I know who uses it, having used MS-DOS (And other DOS) Mac iOS and Windows all swear by Linux. Still have other machines for what they need to do, but swear that Linux is the way to go. Ill see when I start using it.

If you have an old XP machine with at least a fast processor for it's time that runs slow, wipe it clean and install Ubuntu Linux. You'll notice it gets MUCH faster!

http://www.ubuntu.com/desktop

[Fourtyfive]

For those of you that need it , Comcast provides Norton for FREE to it's users.

[Guest Lester Weevils]

The only reason Macs are not hacked as much is because there are few of them, Viruses have become big business, and it isnt worth the time to infect 10% of the worlds computers when you can do 90% at once. As Macs OS's become more prevalent (Because just like Win 8 (or visa versa) Mac OS is a cross platform OS it will begin showing up on more and more devices, not speaking of cell phones, more tablets than just the iPad, more netbooks, more everything, more portabe computer designs, atacks on the Mac OS will increase, right now it is just not worth it for hackers. 

 

Mac's unix base does make it somewhat more secure for raw naked takeovers. For instance, just landing on a site newly taken over by a new infection, and getting infected just by visiting the dang web page. Which has happened to me on a pc, only about a year ago. And I'm purt cautious and thought I was pertected.

 

A big weakness in any puter system is the user. One thing about Mac which IMO aggravates that weakness-- The system is so security-conscious that it pops up a user authorization screen to do any little thing. Users get so accustomed to typing their admin password in order to dismiss the dialog and get on with business, that they don't pay attention to what the heck is asking for authorization to the sensitive directories in the system. So if a trojan pops up an access request, many users, even experts, are likely to type in their password without thinking. Kinda like automatically handing your car keys to some stranger on the street if he just comes up and asks for them.

 

What do you think of Ubuntu Linux as far as viruses go? I've never heard of Ubuntu Linux getting a virus. None of my Linux PC's have a firewall or anti-virus. Well, my router has a hardware firewall.

 

I haven't used it enough to know. About three years ago TGO briefly had an infection that was coming in attached to a third party advertisement. For experiment, I ran ubuntu in a VMWare virtual machine, the virtual machine running hosted on a mac, and I was poking around on the TGO that was infected for those few hours.

 

After cruising the site for awhile, I got the strangest message from the VMWare host. I think it was the host but maybe it was ubuntu. Wish I'd written down the message, but it was a warning that something was trying to get access to the network outside the sandbox. Trying to break out of the virtual machine and get on my local network! I've never seen that message either before or after that day.

 

So I don't know if it would have succeeded if I'd given it enough time, but decided that with such activity it would not be wise to let the experiment continue. Lest maybe the hacker would figure out a way to get out of the virtual machine and onto my mac or even the local network itself. :)

Edited November 20, 2013 by Lester Weevils

[Oh Shoot]

 For one thing in the Industry AVG Pro is known for being very slow or last in updating their definitions.

 

Don't have the Pro but AVG free updates defs every day, and if you happen to check more often than auto, often more than once per 24 hours.

 

It, a router, and modicum of caution have served me well for a good number of years now.

 

- OS

Edited November 21, 2013 by Oh Shoot

[Fourtyfive]

I hear this all the time. Macs DO get viruses, and have for years. The reason Macs have that reputation is not because they DO NOT get viruses, but Apple only holds 10% of the desktop and laptop Market, MS holds 90% globally and nearly 100% of the business market (Which is why they will be supporting XP for another 12 years on the business end). It isnt any harder to attack the MAC OS than it is to attack the MS OS's. The reason the MS OS's are attacked so frequently has been well known for years, because its easier to attack the OS's that control 90% of the market, more profitable and MORE FUN for the jackasses that do it.

 

Ever heard of Honk Kong? Its an replicator trojan that wiped out tons of Macs in the 90's. Ever heard of Apple Script? Another Trojan that opened a back door and allowed hackers to take control of and steal user data.. 

 

Hell rts? Another backdoor Mac virus that allows hackers to steal data.

 

The only reason Macs are not hacked as much is because there are few of them, Viruses have become big business, and it isnt worth the time to infect 10% of the worlds computers when you can do 90% at once. As Macs OS's become more prevalent (Because just like Win 8 (or visa versa) Mac OS is a cross platform OS it will begin showing up on more and more devices, not speaking of cell phones, more tablets than just the iPad, more netbooks, more everything, more portabe computer designs, atacks on the Mac OS will increase, right now it is just not worth it for hackers. 

 

Not wanting to start a rant or fight  :slapfight: , so don't take it that way ; we have better things to discuss , like guns.

 

I never said a MAC could not get a virus and never implied it.

 

I used to be a staunch Microsoft supporter for 35 years , I thought that Apple was the enemy and told others so. I then began to notice that my favorite closet for electronic parts was filling up with computer parts ; RAM , sound boards , video boards , AC power converters , cooling fans , blah blah blah. I can take a standard PC apart and assemble it in my sleep. Standard PC's are nothing but a BOX OF PARTS. Rarely ever are any of the components from the same country , ever wonder why they have to put the sticker on them says "Intel Inside !" , thats because you have no idea where the rest of the boards and memory are from ! ( Ok , my IMac's are Intel driven.)

 

After seeing the parts I had hoarded after upgrading this and that and spending ridiculous amounts of money on the next version of Windows and anti-virus software ; 95,98, Vista, Home , Home Pro, Windows Whatever 2999 , blue screens of death , THIS PROGRAM IS NOT RESPONDING ; I got an iPhone.

 

The Sun came out , I got everyone in the family an iPhone.  Wow , no more rebooting , no more crashes , no more .... I got an iPad  , then I got a Macbook Pro , then I got 5 IMacs , one large one for home and 4 for my office. I now do not own any Window operating device anywhere , I know that Java is hiding in my TV , coffee maker and Macs.....

 

I could not be any happier and after 4 years of Apple purchasing I do not have 1 extra part for any of them anywhere ! ( Ok , maybe a charger cable here or there. )

Edited November 21, 2013 by Threeeighty