🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <bontchev.725813879@fbihh> bontchev@fbihh.informatik.uni-hamburg.de writes:
>Let's consider Unix - a typical system with memory protection,
>discretionary access control, and all that jazz. Absolutely nothing in
>this system prevents a virus from infecting ALL executable files of a
>particular user. Between the different users on one and the same
>system the virus will not spread that well, because users don't often
>execute programs that belong to other users. An exception is the
>"users" bin and root. Once one of those users executes an infected
>file, the virus will spread in the system like a wildfire. But again,
>those users do not often execute programs that belong to other
>users...

Actually, I wouldn't consider Unix to be typical either.  Yes, it's
possible for a user to infect his own personal executable, then share
that executable with another user who then gets his own executables
infected.  True enough.  But, it's not possible for them to infect
the operating system unless one of those user executables is run by
an account with permissions (which should never happen).  The chances
to spread are greatly reduced, and the chances of mass spread through
the operating system are eliminated.

>Between different systems the virus will have even less chance to
>spread, because the sharing of programs occurs mainly in the form of
>source code. You do not walk around with infected tapes and do not run
>the programs on them on different machines, as you do in the PC world.
>That's why, in multi-user systems the worms and the trojans are of
>much more concern than the usual viruses.

This is the case with current Unix systems, but it may not always be the
case, unfortunately.
--scott