I Believe That’s The Worm

It was only a matter of time, but now that it’s out there, getting it’s day or so of mainstream press, aren’t we all having fun? I’m talking, of course, about the LoveSan/MSBlaster worm that takes advantage of the huge giant gaping festering RPC/DCOM holes in pretty much every version of Microsoft Windows out there.

Usually these worms and vulnerabilities are never much more than a minor annoyance, and even then mostly for office workers (“Larry in the server room said there was some you know virus thing slowing down the network today; couldn’t check my Hotmail at lunch”). But things were a little different yesterday here in Maryland, where our DMV was rendered paralyzed by this badboy, news I got firsthand from someone trying to get an ID at the time and couldn’t. My response? I hate to, well, blast Microsoft, but next time your state announces intentions to spend your tax dollars on massively insecure software, speak up. There are plenty of alternatives, proprietary and open. We make choices.

But anyway, the press/info/blog/commentary roundup: Washington Post, Baltimore Sun, Slashdot, a bunch from C|Net News.com, Vulns.com 1 and 2, Symantec’s analysis of the the worm, Network World 1 and 2, Wired News, Silicon Valley @ Internet.com, The Register, The Sydney Morning Herald, Bowulf (he’s got choice info links), BBC News, Troy Jessup, eWeek on the international spread, and finally the ultra-meta Google News autoroundup.

UNGH! Call me Donny! Call my Joey! Who’s your favorite InfoSec aggregator?! Watch me get loose! Also, bonus points if you caught the Family Guy reference in this entry’s title (fine print: bonus points redeemable absofuckinglutely nowhere, especially not where point-redeeming stations were running Windows).