Computer Viruses and The People That Create Them

[Saphire]

My poor DH has been franticly trying to figure out a computer virus at his company. I seldom see him as frustrated as when he has to deal with these kinds of problems. Behind his frustration is the unfathomable realization that there are people out there that plot and plan and work very hard to create these viruses that cause havoc in our world. Who are these people and what are they like? Why do they do it? When they go to sleep at night, do they feel satisfaction that they caused so much grief? I just don't understand.

 

[GRUMPY PIRATE]

A lot of times its designed to specifically enable them to get into a system or systems.

Sometimes its because they used to work at a place and they preceive that the company has done them a disservice, and it is "payback" for a wrong, imagined or real.

Some do it for fun.

(and some say they work for a company that sells you the Anti-virus programs!!)

 

[pdchris]

Just curious: how did it get in? Are they running a/v on their desktops?

 

[POOHDRMR]

The satisfaction to know they are smart enough to create one that worked and got past virus protection.

 

[H.E. Pennypacker]

My poor DH has been franticly trying to figure out a computer virus at his company. I seldom see him as frustrated as when he has to deal with these kinds of problems. Behind his frustration is the unfathomable realization that there are people out there that plot and plan and work very hard to create these viruses that cause havoc in our world. Who are these people and what are they like? Why do they do it? When they go to sleep at night, do they feel satisfaction that they caused so much grief? I just don't understand.

I can understand your DH's frustration. I'm so glad I don't work in desktop application support anymore. (I'm doing data warehousing and business intelligence now.) Back when I did, we spent a few long nights and weekends cleaning up after getting hit by some big ones. Fortunately firewalls, spamblockers and antivirus software has come a long way, so devastating attacks are few and far between. It still amazes me at the amount of time and effort people put into building these viruses. They're clearly not "all there" in my opinion. If they'd put their talent and ingenuity to use building something worthwhile, they could probably retire as the next Bill Gates. Instead they get off by screwing people up with their viruses, malware and other crap.

 

[JCJRSmith]

I firmly believe there is a special level of hell reserved for hackers, virus writers and spammers.

 

[dcentity2000]

Hackers and spammers are horrible people. They exist to make life for others miserable at great expense to themselves and don't care about the consequences.

Awful people.



Rich::

 

[Saphire]

Just curious: how did it get in? Are they running a/v on their desktops?

Yes, they run a/v on desktops and network. This was a form of malicious spyware which isn't always detected and often comes through e-mail links. Also, this machine was a stand alone laptop not covered by the corporate a/v.

 

[LisaR]

The sad thing is that these are incredibly intelligent people. They could probably do so many good things with their talent instead of using it for destruction. Ok, that sounds like the theme from a superhero show but you know what I mean.

 

[pdchris]

Yes, they run a/v on desktops and network. This was a form of malicious spyware which isn't always detected and often comes through e-mail links. Also, this machine was a stand alone laptop not covered by the corporate a/v.

Well, then, it actually wasn't a virus. I misunderstood hence my question. Yes, spy- and malware are insidious and quite good in some cases. Antivirus2009 is particularly nasty and hard to delete off of a computer. We do our best but sometimes something will get through.
We looked into a network access control (NAC) at work to handle laptops such as you describe. Unfortunately, the cost is still pretty high.
I've just started rolling out a combined a/v, a/s package to desktops and, hopefully, it'll do better than what we had. Since I don't want to be seen as endorsing a product, if you care to pm me, I'll give you the name.