[Info-vax] "Shanghai Stock Exchange" and OpenVMS

[Jan-Erik Söderholm]

Richard B. Gilbert wrote:
> johnwallace4 at yahoo.co.uk wrote:
>> On Jan 22, 2:38 am, "Richard B. Gilbert" <rgilber... at comcast.net>
>> wrote:
>>> koeh... at spock.koehler.athome.net wrote:
>>>> In article <6thdpsFb03n... at mid.individual.net>, billg... at cs.uofs.edu 
>>>> (Bill Gunshannon) writes:
>>>>> How many tmes you going to trot out this same tired story.  Getting 
>>>>> hit with
>>>>> a virus is not as much a OS or system problem as it is a user problem.
>>>>    Which is why we get hit with virii on VMS every day?
>>>>    Seriously, heavily trained Windows admins have not been able to 
>>>> protect
>>>>    our Windows systems.  Not if they're plugged in and turned on.
>>> You can safely plug them in and turn them on.  It's when you connect
>>> them to a network that you have to worry about "electronic organisms"
>>> infecting your Windows systems.
>>
>> "It's when you connect them to a network that you have to worry"
>>
>> Or also when you allow storage devices or files originating from
>> another box to be plugged in (eg via CD or USB stick) to the system
>> we're considering - there are other virus transport mechanisms besides
>> network connections (maybe you meant that but didn't say it as
>> such)...
>>
>> So the choice would seem to be permanent isolation, or permanent
>> worry, or keep taking the happy pills. It's obviously unthinkable to
>> change the underlying OS, right?
> 
> Storage devices have been a vector for malware in the past, but you 
> don't hear much about such incidents any longer!
> 
> Once upon at time the mad race to "steal" software fueled the flow of 
> virii via floppy disks.  While it's still possible, to propagate a virus 
> in this way, I don't think it's anywhere near as common as it used to be!

I saw a report from someone a few days ago where he had "fixed"
an USB-stick so that it would, simply by inserting it into a PC,
download anything he found "intersting" from the Windows box onto
the stick. Without using keybord, mouse or antthing else. If he
could do that, he could probably also write anything he liked
to the PC.