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What would you think about somebody or a website that would install an OS using exploitable bugs in a web browser, that would overwrite Windows the next time it's restarted (maybe that would look like Win95)?

This question is because I have a good scare when my system locked up and I restarted it and then it said something like "?ÿ=¡?¿ cannot locate KERNEL.BIN", and I thought "Hey, what happened? I have just lost all of my development disk!!!!". But that was all...

Stop using Internet Explorer? Install some sort of Anti-virus software?..

Stop using "Microsoft" Windows?

All seem like all are very viable options...

Could happen to Linux just as well, if it weren't such an "unstable" target platform (as in, no two Linux distros are alike, so the number of potential security penetrations / exploit is not as high).

What I would think of it? I don't really care what an exploit does. It could install the best OS of the world and migrate all my data without loss, I'd still be out for the author's hide.

The thing is "Solar".. Most sane people don't login as root and browse the Internet.. Thus such "kernel" tampering might not be as possible..

Windows does what? Make every account an "Administrator" by default?

It's not as easy to hijack a UNIX-like system if permissions are decent..

Calling Linux secure just because you don't surf as root would be the same as calling Windows secure if only you don't surf as Administrator.

Don't feel safe. Check http://www.gentoo.org/security/en/glsa/, just for example, and think about when you did your last system update. Running "rm -rf ~" with your user is embarassingly easy even for a script-kiddie if your system is not up-to-date - just as with Windows.

Linux enjoys a kind of "protection" that is partly based in lack of market share, and partly in that the userbase is more "geekish" and less prone to stupid worm attacks, and partly in that Windows is such a "fun" target for virus hackers that hate Microsoft out of principle. Protection #1 and #2 are bound to erode over time.

Do you have an antivirus / rootkit checker that is being updated regularily, or do you really think "it cannot happen to me, my OS is secure"?

I didn't say Linux.. I Don't use Linux.. I use OpenBSD.. and I do keep it up to date and secure..

Brynet-Inc wrote:I didn't say Linux.. I Don't use Linux.. I use OpenBSD.. and I do keep it up to date and secure..

FreeBSD: Pure speed
NetBSD: Pure security
OpenBSD: Pure arrogance

~ wrote:"?ÿ=¡?¿ cannot locate KERNEL.BIN"

That was just a very strange thing, I don't even have such similar string in my projects... I don't know how Windows came to slow down until locking up and display that on the next boot...

Presumably, that's an error message from the "trojan os"

The curious fact is that there wasn't such crap... just an error... a strange error I found out to be good to share and comment...

Have you used a ipod on this sys ?, also think what a hacked linux boot loader, can do with a time delay.

Dex wrote:Have you used a ipod on this sys ?, also think what a hacked linux boot loader, can do with a time delay.

An I-Pod? No... maybe a weird bug made some binary I was handling (not even compiling?) to go over the Windows memory area and it had that failed loading effect after resetting.

~ wrote:

Dex wrote:Have you used a ipod on this sys ?, also think what a hacked linux boot loader, can do with a time delay.

An I-Pod? No... maybe a weird bug made some binary I was handling (not even compiling?) to go over the Windows memory area and it had that failed loading effect after resetting.

It was just a friend of mine, had a simular probem when using a linux_ipod to put linux on his ipod, using a installer from windows .
If you get a reset, then alots of time you need to boot your PC again, as i have notest that if i am testing some hobby OS and it crash the PC, on restarting the keyboard prints the wrong letter to screen.

~ wrote:What would you think about somebody or a website that would install an OS using exploitable bugs in a web browser, that would overwrite Windows the next time it's restarted (maybe that would look like Win95)?

This question is because I have a good scare when my system locked up and I restarted it and then it said something like "?ÿ=¡?¿ cannot locate KERNEL.BIN", and I thought "Hey, what happened? I have just lost all of my development disk!!!!". But that was all...

That's just probably a corrupted boot sector.

But as Brynet-Inc said, switch to a unix OS (just in case it was something more serious )

I would have thought that this being an OS devlopment forum there wouldn't be so many pro-unix/anti-microsoft people.

It's like arguing which rotten fruit is better, who cares? They are both based off outdated and rotting designs.