h a l f b a k e r yFutility is persistent.
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So, the major anti-virus/malware companies struggle to
keep up with new exploits as they come up, but the
majority of computer vulnerabilities come from lack of
protection or lack of security updates.
So
Every time a new virus comes out, one of these
companies
writes a new version of
it, using the same exploit, and
removing any particularly harmful code (and yes, I do
realize there are cases where the exploit itself is what
causes the harm, these couldn't be used, I also realize
that many exploits wouldn't allow the sort of access
required for this). This version
could do one of two things.
From a profit perspective,
the
most obvious thing is to use it to pop up a very clear
"your
system is vulnerable to virii/malware message.
From a general security perspective, it would make sense
to use the exploit to gain enough access to the system to
install a patch or a definitions update as appropriate,
closing it's own loophole.
Obviously this shouldn't be released during the early
"epidemic" days of a new exploit, only after the
responsible people have already patched their systems.
[link]
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Avoids mentioning the rumour that it's the anti-virus companies writing all those viruses affecting Windows machines....damn, I'm a complete blabberfingers. |
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It seems to be a word with a strange, irregular declension, so that it has no attested plural* in Latin - and, if we were to try inferring one by analogy, it's not clear what it should be. |
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Hence, as with fourth-declension nouns such as "status" (which do have plurals but, in the nominative, those plurals read the same as their singulars), I think we should fall back on an English plural form "-uses" |
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*Because it refers to continuous substances - "slime" or "poison" - and not to discrete objects |
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Come to think of it, [not_morrison_rm], given that the plural used on this site seems to be "linuces"*, not linicia - implying either f. or m. but not n. - I think you must mean "linux, linux, linucem..." |
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*Or am I thinking of "unices"? |
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The use of virii as the plural in IT circles is well
documented. Regardless of it's status as a Latin
plural, it is one in English. |
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