Worm crashes Coastguard computers (UK)

[TacticalPeek]

Worm crashes Coastguard
computers

By Charles Arthur, Technology
Editor

05 May 2004
Computers at the Coastguard Agency were
among millions of PCs hit yesterday by a new
worm that spreads over the internet.
The Sasser worm, which exploits a flaw in
Microsoft's Windows software, disrupted work
at the Marine and Coastguard Agency, forcing
staff to use pencil and paper to find ships and
locate distress calls on maps.
The worm, which appeared over the weekend,
began spreading rapidly yesterday as people
returned from the bank holiday and brought
laptops that had been infected while surfing
the internet, or turned on vulnerable machines
inside offices.

http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/this_britain/story.jsp?story=518242

[Skittles]

1. these hackers need to get serious jail time

they threaten people's lives

[classics]

5. Its the administrators fault.

He should be fired, a patch has been available for weeks.

Someone is asleep at the switch.

[Skittles]

10. I mean in general

not this specific virus. What bothers me is that hackers are talented people yet THIS is how they choose to use their talents?

[Nihil]

11. No lives threatened in this case

Hi Skittles!

Just to say that this bit ...

>... disrupted work at the Marine and Coastguard Agency, forcing staff
> to use pencil and paper to find ships and locate distress calls on maps

... is wrong - the Coastguard spokeswoman cleared that up yesterday.
The systems affected were the back office ones (general admin crap) and
not the emergency response ones (used to locate distress calls, etc.).

Yes, it's still a pain.
Yes, the admin for the back-office systems needs a kick.
Yes, Microsoft still produces over-priced badly-engineered heaps of shit.
Yes, even reputable newspapers sometimes hype things up a little.
No, there were no lives threatened in this instance.

(End of public service announcement :hi:)
Nihil

[amber dog democrat]

2. Another good reason to not use Microsoft.

Lennox, Unix, or Macs don't seem to get as much attention.

I have no use for Windows - unless I am forced to.

[Twillig]

3. Windows and Naval services don't go together well, even now.

do they?

Remember the Yorktown!
http://www.gcn.com/archives/gcn/1998/july13/cov2.htm
“Because of politics, some things are being forced on us that without political pressure we might not do, like Windows NT,” Redman said. “If it were up to me I probably would not have used Windows NT in this particular application. If we used Unix, we would have a system that has less of a tendency to go down.”

[amber dog democrat]

4. Oh, man.

This is what comes from drinking too much Microsoft coolade.
But that has always been the case for a company good at defending weak products.

[54anickel]

6. HA! Thanks for that trip down memory lane. I remember it well, now

that you brought it up. NORAD had just started purchasing PCs with Windows from our company shortly before this happened.

We were all shocked, shocked I tell you that we even landed such an order from NORAD. The buzz was this is great for the company, but we weren't feeling too safe with our defense systems running Windblows. Then the Yorktown hit the news. Funny, but I guess maybe you had to be there.
Thanks again for the chuckle.

[chenGOD]

8. Lennox?

Like the boxer? :)

[MGKrebs]

7. Since when did worms get drivers licenses for Coast Guard computers?

[freeforall]

9. Windows has Worms

Why would any large company or government department use this operating system?

Always de-worming or debugging.