Masonry Magazine December 2006 Page. 32
TECHNOLOGY
Virus authors often are people looking for some kind of social recognition or notoriety. Their principal objective is to exploit whatever possible means (e.g., security holes, user naivety, new technology) to ensure their creations spread as widely as possible. Oftentimes, they simply rely on the natural curiosity of most people, they lure the recipient of a malware-loaded e-mail into opening it, clicking on the embedded link, opening an attachment, going to an infected website, or otherwise releasing the malware into their system. Unfortunately, one of the weakest links in computer security is often the user, not the system.
To combat this problem, antivirus software generally tries to catch the offensive program at the point of entry, determining what e-mail messages are potentially threats, what attachments meet the criteria for the latest threats, and in general working behind the scenes to protect the system and user - and sometimes the system from the user. The first line of defense, and the one that gets the most attention, is the antivirus segment. Familiar developers in this market are Symantec (www.symantec.com) and McAfee (www.mcafee.com/us). A lesser known but growing company is Panda Software of Bilbao, Spain. In test after test, Panda's security products score as high or higher than the better known brands, but they are, in many ways, the silent, stealth vendor. As such, many hackers around the world fail to defend against Panda's products while actively embedding code to override the antivirus programs of the other, more mainstream, manufacturers.
Ryan Sherstobitoff, CTO of Panda Software's U.S. office in Glendale, Calif., noted, "Panda's products are designed to include protection technologies to address various problems facing the SMB (small to medium business) market. One of Panda's key innovations, TruPrevent was designed to respond to emerging threats not immediately identified by virus laboratories. These threats pose a significant risk to SMBs because of the advanced capabilities of replicating to a large number of machines in a small amount of time. The dynamics of malicious software have changed to include a focal point of organized crime with the sole purpose of financial gain through data theft on unsuspecting users."
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Image © 2006 Jupiterimages Corporation
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30 Masonry
CIRCLE 165 ON READER SERVICE CARD
December 2006
Updates and Patches
IF YOU READ the computer columns in the local paper or watch almost any news show on television, you've certainly heard about the exposed vulnerabilities in Microsoft software products. However, any program that can or needs access to the Internet - which includes practically every software program under the sun is vulnerable to attack. We often hear about Microsoft products, not because they are the most susceptible, but because its software is the most prevalent and presents the biggest target. A "boutique" virus writer might focus on vul-
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