[ale] nailing down firefox security and privacy - PT 1

[jim.kinney at gmail.com (Jim Kinney)]

That's a very narrow definition of malware. What term is more suitable?
Deceitware? Clickware?
ALL malware requires some degree of human processing.  At a minimum, someone
must join power source to computer power input. Surely that act of human
involvement would not relegate all forms of miscreant operations involving
software out of the bad or 'mal' designation.
Symantical hair-splitting rarely works well with this group. Best keep
philosophical discussions at a high enough level to avoid overly passionate
nuance flame wars
On Oct 13, 2011 6:28 PM, "Pat Regan" <thehead at patshead.com> wrote:

> On Thu, 13 Oct 2011 17:16:50 -0400
> David Tomaschik <david at systemoverlord.com> wrote:
>
> > On Thu, Oct 13, 2011 at 3:58 PM, Pat Regan <thehead at patshead.com>
> > wrote:
> > > If the malware in question here were using an exploit, why would it
> > > bother trying to get the user to click on it?
> > >
> > > Pat
> >
> > You've never seen "AntiVirus 2009" (and I imagine there is 2010, 2011,
> > etc., but I stopped doing any Windows support in 2009).  It's malware
> > that pretends to do an AV scan, finds a list of things, and tells you
> > it can remove them... for $39.99.  You go to their website, put in
> > their credit card details, and you're toast.  I'm not sure if they
> > actually charge you $39.99, just capture your CC info, or both.  Never
> > tried it to find out.
> >
>
> I understand the concept.  What I'm saying is that any malware that
> has to trick someone into installing it is almost certainly not making
> use of any exploits.  If it were, it wouldn't need to attempt to
> socially engineer the user.
>
> Pat
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