Re: Virus

From: Will Wagers (hyle@gte.net)
Date: Sat Dec 26 1998 - 06:47:43 EST


>Will:
>I appreciate that your motives are for the best, but along with excellent
>advice you are uneccesarily spreading alarm and despondency.

I resent your tone.

>You wrote:
>>>In these cases, the ASCII is the virus. So, don't open attachments from
>>anyone you don't know.<<
>
>The second part is the good advice, the first is simply not true.
...
>However, ASCII _on its own_ cannot execute.
>
>One way which the vandals seized on in the first version of Eudora 4 ( and
>Netscape v.4 as well ) was to exploit the _very long_ file names possible
>in this version to carry code which would wreak its damage ONCE THE FILE
>HAD EXECUTED.
>
>Another way is to exploit weaknesses in the design of the macro software. [
>see below ]

As far as your criticism goes, you proceed to give the same two examples
I gave. The Eudora bug *tricks* the computer into executing an ASCII
filename. The WORD macros are ASCII, which WORD dutifully executes, as it
should.

Your point that ASCII on its own cannot execute is non-sensical. No
external representation of bits can execute on its own. It is the computer
which executes the bit patterns, and ASCII is simply a bit pattern to the
computer.

>But, for the last time, ASCII on its own cannot execute.

You are dead wrong. As any programmer knows, as far as the computer is
concerned, there is no ASCII. The computer will happily--though usually
unhappily for the user--attempt to execute ASCII as machine code. And,
this is precisely how the Eudora bug works, by tricking Eudora into
executing ASCII ! It is not necessary to trick Word to execute ASCII macros.
Nor is it necessary to trick a browser into executing ASCII Java and
Javascript viruses.

I will not discuss this further on B-Greek. Anyone who is interested can
pursue the issue in an article entitled "Is Email No Longer Safe to Read?"
in the Dec 98 issue of _WEB Techniques_, p. 12.

>One other thing: you do realize, don't you, that you have unwittingly
>contributed to an urban legend.

No, it is you who contribute to the legend--that there is no such thing as
an ASCII virus.

Will Wagers hyle@gte.net "Reality is the best metaphor."

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