The Null Device
Posts matching tags 'trojans'
2002/5/8
Extreme marketing in the new millennium: Here come the banner ads which install spyware, disable firewall software; the rogue pop-up ad in question uses a Shockwave applet and an Internet Explorer bug to surreptitiously download and install the software onto the user's PC. Needless to say, it only affects the 99.999% of users who use Windows; Maccies and Penguinheads can look smug.
1999/9/13
The famous paper by Ken Thompson (the creator of the original UNIX), in which he describes his infamous self-perpetuating C compiler/login trojan horse.
The moral is obvious. You can't trust code that you did not totally create yourself... No amount of source-level verification or scrutiny will protect you from using untrusted code... As the level of program gets lower, these bugs will be harder and harder to detect. A well installed microcode bug will be almost impossible to detect.