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View Full Version : Microsoft releasing emergency patch



James Jaragosky
12-17-2008, 1:24 AM
Here is the full story.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20081216/ts_alt_afp/uschinaitinternetsoftwarecrimemicrosoft

I have switched to Opera as of tonight.
Now I need to find a way of adding all my book marks backinto Opera.

Chuck Wintle
12-17-2008, 6:18 AM
Here is the full story.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20081216/ts_alt_afp/uschinaitinternetsoftwarecrimemicrosoft

I have switched to Opera as of tonight.
Now I need to find a way of adding all my book marks backinto Opera.
I have used Firefox almost exclusively for the past several years. It does not seem to have the security problems that plague IE and, when patches are needed, they are provided quickly. i fail to understand why, Microsoft, with all the resources at their disposal, cannot button up security problems better in IE. :D

Joe Pelonio
12-17-2008, 8:39 AM
I have used Firefox almost exclusively for the past several years. It does not seem to have the security problems that plague IE and, when patches are needed, they are provided quickly. i fail to understand why, Microsoft, with all the resources at their disposal, cannot button up security problems better in IE. :D
Me too, in fact I just got a Firefox update so something must be going on.
The problem with IE is that hackers hate MS, so they attack it relentlessly, always looking for new ways to penetrate, and pretty much leave the other browsers alone.

Dennis Peacock
12-17-2008, 8:50 AM
I use the Google Chrome browser and like it really well. I still have to use MSIE because my day job requires it.

Angus Hines
12-17-2008, 10:02 AM
I've been using Firefox since it's inception. Because Bill Gates is an idiot, granted a wealthy idiot, but still an idiot.

Sean Troy
12-17-2008, 10:37 AM
I can't understand why people have such hate for Bill gates. Without a doubt, he is one of the brightest people in this country and he gives more money to charity than anyone else in this country. The only thing I can think of is jealousy. If IE was so bad, why does 75+% of the worlds computer users use it?

Bonnie Campbell
12-17-2008, 11:09 AM
I don't hate Bill Gates, I just don't care for his business tactics of never 'quite' getting his systems working before he pops out another. I do give him credit for opening up the internet to a LOT more people. IE has been trouble since it started. Granted, it's hacking idiots that ought to be shot, but you'd think by now they'd clear up the security issues. I use IE only when I have to for certain sites, otherwise I use Firefox.

John Schreiber
12-17-2008, 11:29 AM
I can't understand why people have such hate for Bill gates.
I don't hate him or Microsoft, but we generally have no option but to use their products and where there are no options there is usually resentment. The products generally work well, but our tolerance for fault with computers is low. This example with IE shows that despite multiple new releases of their software, it is still fundamentally open to attack. Each attack can be thwarted after it arrives, but the software, which we must use, is vulnerable.

Vista. That says a lot too.

It's not up for a bail out, but can you imagine if MS were in financial trouble? It's another organization which is "Too Big to Fail".

Neal Clayton
12-17-2008, 11:32 AM
Me too, in fact I just got a Firefox update so something must be going on.
The problem with IE is that hackers hate MS, so they attack it relentlessly, always looking for new ways to penetrate, and pretty much leave the other browsers alone.

i don't think it's really that they hate microsoft, it's that with the integration of a multitude of applications it's easy to find a flaw. explorer and internet explorer are linked. one can easily affect the other. therefore if a flaw is found in any windows program that integrates with explorer, an internet explorer flaw can piggy back over to it.

some might call it a basic design flaw, that a browser can so easily integrate with the shell of the OS. on the other hand it makes 'net enabled applications alot easier to develop, so what are the tradeoffs of not having it.

as firefox has added more shell integration options into their browser they've suffered some of the same exploits as well here recently, just not as many yet.

however i do agree that firefox is inherently 'safer' for lack of a better word, due to the nature of having millions of critics of the code, rather than tens or hundreds.

John Schreiber
12-17-2008, 11:34 AM
And another thing. This problem is out there taking over who knows how many computers and Microsoft still doesn't have a fix for it. They can't even shut the barn door after the cows are gone.

I don't doubt that it really is hard to fix, but the problem exists because the software was poorly designed in the first place and it hasn't been changed despite now being on version 6?

Curt Harms
12-17-2008, 11:40 AM
I can't understand why people have such hate for Bill gates. Without a doubt, he is one of the brightest people in this country and he gives more money to charity than anyone else in this country. The only thing I can think of is jealousy. If IE was so bad, why does 75+% of the worlds computer users use it?

Marketing? IMO, Microsoft's marketing and licensing are without equal. Dancing around the antitrust issues? Well, Bill Gates Jr.(Bill 3rd's father) was a corporate attorney. Technological prowess? Not so much. Bear in mind the WinNT kernel was not a MS product, it was produced under contract by a team from Digital Equipment.

Sean Troy
12-17-2008, 11:45 AM
I think one of the larger problems is that people just don't keep thier anti-virus protection updated and other updates as needed. I know so many people who get these viruses get upset about it but when asked if they have thier protection updated, they say " I do every once in awhile". You can't count on automatic up-dates, they don't always happen in time.

Greg Peterson
12-17-2008, 12:38 PM
MS presents a large target. Apple and Linux are much smaller players, so don't draw the attention that MS products do. Apple tends to do a better job in their OS of preventing the average user from running their computer with full, unquestioned administrator rights and privileges. I assume that the average Linux user is savvy enough in the first place to prevent this loophole for hackers.

MS products generally work well and I use many of them. There is no doubt they have made my life easier. My complaint with MS is that their anti-competitive nature, fostered by Gates himself from day one, has stifled advancements in hardware and software. I can't speak to MS's tactics these days, but while they were building their software empire they engaged in many practices that while ultimately was good for their bottom line, it deprived consumers of choice and better products. MS was sued in both the US and the EU for antitrust. And both courts have fundamentally opposite definitions of antitrust.

So all we can do is hope MS plays by the rules and doesn't impede, delay or stop future advancements in hardware and software.

I use Firefox exclusively at work and home. Makes life easier. :D Except of course when I need to get Windows updates. Then we have a prime example of how MS forces consumers to use MS products.

Don Farr
12-17-2008, 1:24 PM
I use the Google Chrome browser and like it really well. I still have to use MSIE because my day job requires it.

Where your ears burning last week?:) David and I were out in my shop and your name came up. We were just wondering how youve been.
Don

Pat Germain
12-17-2008, 1:42 PM
I think one of the larger problems is that people just don't keep thier anti-virus protection updated and other updates as needed. I know so many people who get these viruses get upset about it but when asked if they have thier protection updated, they say " I do every once in awhile". You can't count on automatic up-dates, they don't always happen in time.

Not even updating anti-virus protection works. Oh sure, it helps. But every single time one of my computers has become infected, the latest and greatest anti-virus software, which I pay for, failed to even identify, let alone clean it.

Invariably, I find a free cleaning tool that I must download and run and that gets rid of it. So why am I paying for Norton Antivirus?

I've had it will all the security and infection problems. I have nothing against Microsoft or Bill Gates. But my next computer will be a Mac. Sure, there's much debate about this. But I have yet to meet a single person who switched to Mac and regretted it.

Sean Troy
12-17-2008, 1:53 PM
I do like macs, I just can't afford them. My first computer was a mac performa 450, or something like that. It had a wopping 16 meg. It cried if I wrote over three paragraphs :)

John Schreiber
12-17-2008, 1:54 PM
I checked about an hour ago and the patch wasn't out. Now it is KB960714.

Robert Eiffert
12-17-2008, 2:39 PM
"Now I need to find a way of adding all my book marks back into Opera."

You could export your bookmarks to Diigo or Delicious, then import to Opera. In Firefox Export is under Bookmarks/organize

Greg Peterson
12-17-2008, 2:54 PM
My boss got an IMac last year. Seemed pretty nice at the time. It's a nice computer for the most part. But Apple is not the end all, be all their base claims. It has crashed on me, frozen up and given me fits. XP Pro seems more stable to me.

With Apple, say good bye to right clicking. Sure you can buy a two button mouse or use the keyboard + mouse click to bring up the context sensitive menu. Not sure why this qualifies as easier. Not sure why they don't make a two button mouse standard equipment.

Two delete keys. Tell a user to use their backspace key and they won't find it. Tell them to use the delete key and they'll ask which one. Brilliant.

Home and end keys operate very differently in Apple world.

And the action of the pointer is just kind of insensitive/sluggish. Speeding it up doesn't really fix it. At least for me.

If you're used to Windows, you'll have a lot of unlearning to do to use a Mac. And right now I'm trying to get Adobe Reader to print from this IMac and it just freezes. Safari, Apples browser, won't even let me use Apples web site. Unable to connect to it. Firefox works great though.

Apple may like to market themselves as counter culture, but between the IMac and my IPod nano, they're far more similar to every other offering than they are dissimilar. They do ask a premium price though.

Jerome Hanby
12-17-2008, 3:50 PM
I think the big security weakness in IE is that it's really just a big bag of Active X controls. That make it pretty versatile and those controls can be leveraged by programmers (If you can deal with all that COM stuff and keep your sanity), but it means that there are interfaces between all of those controls that can be exploited...

Neal Clayton
12-18-2008, 12:03 PM
Not even updating anti-virus protection works. Oh sure, it helps. But every single time one of my computers has become infected, the latest and greatest anti-virus software, which I pay for, failed to even identify, let alone clean it.

Invariably, I find a free cleaning tool that I must download and run and that gets rid of it. So why am I paying for Norton Antivirus?


exactly, every windows machine i've recently built for people no longer has a paid AV on it either. i simply told them all to not use outlook, not use internet explorer, not use windows media player, and get AVG to scan downloaded files. i set up thunderbird, firefox, and media player classic as replacements. and the rate of getting viruses that way is less than before.