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.
-- MechE, Aug 15 2014

Linux, linux, linux...

Avoids mentioning the rumour that it's the anti-virus companies writing all those viruses affecting Windows machines....damn, I'm a complete blabberfingers.
-- not_morrison_rm, Aug 15 2014


sp. "viruses"

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.

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"

*Because it refers to continuous substances - "slime" or "poison" - and not to discrete objects

Carry on.
-- pertinax, Aug 16 2014


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..."

*Or am I thinking of "unices"?
-- pertinax, Aug 16 2014


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.
-- MechE, Aug 16 2014



random, halfbakery