Techdirt. Stories filed under "zombies" Easily digestible tech news... http://www.techdirt.com/ en-us Techdirt. Stories filed under "zombies"http://www.techdirt.com/images/td-88x31.gifhttp://www.techdirt.com/ Mon, 29 Oct 2012 17:00:00 PDT DailyDirt: Save Yourself From The Zombies, If You Can... Michael Ho http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20101011/11393511367/dailydirt-save-yourself-zombies-if-you-can.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20101011/11393511367/dailydirt-save-yourself-zombies-if-you-can.shtml
  • Some zombies aren't the undead, they're just unthinking folks who might be "in the zone" and focused on other things. Aren't we all zombies in a way? [url]
  • ZAICO is the Zombie Apocalypse Insurance Company for all your post-apocalyptic needs. Don't get caught unprepared -- but maybe choose a low deductible plan because cash might be a bit tight after the zombies take over. [url]
  • A mathematical model of how zombies spread tells us that we need to deal with the zombie apocalypse quickly or else things will get out hand rapidly and bring the end of civilization as we know it. But how would different kinds of international relations policies deal with a zombie threat? [url]
    • If you'd like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post.

    Permalink | Comments | Email This Story
    ]]>     urls-we-dig-up http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20101011/11393511367     Mon, 31 Oct 2011 17:00:00 PDT DailyDirt: Real Zombies... Michael Ho http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20101215/03534512288/dailydirt-real-zombies.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20101215/03534512288/dailydirt-real-zombies.shtml mentioned before, Mother Nature has created a few of her own actual zombies. Here are just a few more examples. By the way, StumbleUpon can recommend some good Techdirt articles, too.

    Permalink | Comments | Email This Story
    ]]>     urls-we-dig-up http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20101215/03534512288     Wed, 10 Aug 2011 17:00:00 PDT DailyDirt: Zombies! Michael Ho http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20091114/0221096928/dailydirt-zombies.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20091114/0221096928/dailydirt-zombies.shtml the CDC!) make some of the premises for these zombie movies sound plausible, but mother nature itself has created a few zombie phenomena as well. Here are just some examples. By the way, StumbleUpon can recommend some good Techdirt articles, too.

    Permalink | Comments | Email This Story
    ]]>     urls-we-dig-up http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20091114/0221096928     Thu, 19 May 2011 03:53:07 PDT Well Done: CDC Warns Of The Zombie Apocalypse Mike Masnick http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110519/02073714336/well-done-cdc-warns-zombie-apocalypse.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110519/02073714336/well-done-cdc-warns-zombie-apocalypse.shtml how to prepare for (and hopefully survive) the Zombie Apocalypse:
    There are all kinds of emergencies out there that we can prepare for. Take a zombie apocalypse for example. That’s right, I said z-o-m-b-i-e a-p-o-c-a-l-y-p-s-e. You may laugh now, but when it happens you’ll be happy you read this, and hey, maybe you’ll even learn a thing or two about how to prepare for a real emergency.
    And, from there it goes into general disaster preparedness, at times relating it back to the impending zombie invasion. We do plenty of complaining about bad government actions around here, but I say kudos for not releasing just a totally bland (it does get a bit dry in the middle) disaster preparedness blog post, but instead, for coming up with a good way to get the info out there that might actually spread (in a good way...).

    Permalink | Comments | Email This Story
    ]]>     brains http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20110519/02073714336     Wed, 23 Mar 2011 22:08:00 PDT South Korea Wants To Mandate Everyone Must Install 'Security' Software To Prevent 'Zombies' Mike Masnick http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110321/00593813570/south-korea-wants-to-mandate-everyone-must-install-security-software-to-prevent-zombies.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110321/00593813570/south-korea-wants-to-mandate-everyone-must-install-security-software-to-prevent-zombies.shtml "Zombie PC Prevention Act," which would require every citizen to install special "security software," on their computers. But, some are worried about the unintended (or secretly intended?) consequences of such an act. The Korean government will officially designate which security solutions are allowed, leading to questions about what might be in or not be in such software. On top of that, this law also has quite a backdoor for government agencies to spy on pretty much any company, because it would empower the Korean Communications Commission to "examine the details of the business, records, documents and others" of anyone, without a warrant, based merely on the suspicion that an employee or the company as a whole did not use such mandated security software.

    An interesting sidenote in all of this is that just as the push to pass this Zombie PC Prevention Act came about, suddenly a hard-drive destroying malware started making the rounds, and some have noted that it acts in a manner that doesn't make any sense when you look at typical malware. Instead, it acts sort of like a "zombie," but whereas typical zombies try to remain hidden, this one does a lot to make itself known. The suggestion -- though, admittedly, with little proof -- is that perhaps someone has released such an attack in order to build up support for the law.

    That may be too much of a conspiracy theory for some, but it is still worrisome that the government might mandate a particular brand of security software. It's obviously a good thing, in general, for people to secure their computers, and to try to ward off malware such as zombies. But should it really be the government's job to step in and mandate what software you put on your computer?

    Permalink | Comments | Email This Story
    ]]>     and-maybe-open-your-computer-up-a-bit http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20110321/00593813570     Thu, 29 Jul 2010 04:29:36 PDT Michael Jackson's Estate Complains About Dancing MJ Zombie In Game Mike Masnick http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100728/01154610391.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100728/01154610391.shtml ReallyEvilCanine alerts us to the news that the game Plants vs. Zombies has decided to change its dancing zombie, because Michael Jackson's estate complained that the zombie looked too much like Jackson. It's true. The zombie is obviously designed to look like Michael Jackson, and my guess (details are lacking) is that the estate threatened a publicity rights claim over the use:
    This seems pretty silly. Publicity rights rules were put in place to try to stop people from thinking a famous person had endorsed a product. I can't see how anyone could have possibly thought that Michael Jackson or the Jackson estate had endorsed this particular game, or the dancing zombie Jackson.

    Permalink | Comments | Email This Story
    ]]>     beat-it http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20100728/01154610391     Wed, 23 Apr 2008 16:39:00 PDT Botnet vs. Botnet: Can A Good Botnet Block A Bad One? Mike Masnick http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20080422/185852921.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20080422/185852921.shtml fighting each other by disabling trojans of competing botnets on their computers -- but it appears that some researchers have a different idea for creating a "good" botnet to fight the "bad" botnets being used for denial of service attacks (found via Slashdot). This is quite different than some older proposals to create "good worms" that go about automatically patching infected machines (which are wide open to abuse). Instead, the idea is rather creative. It involves setting up a distributed system of computers that effectively act as a way station for connect requests -- which then wait for the actual server to request the inbound requests. This prevents the server from being overloaded (though, I would imagine it could slow down access somewhat). Either way, it's nice to see efforts under way to stop such zombie botnets. Hopefully someone isn't sitting on a patent for such an idea and waiting to sue, like we've seen with other security measures.

    Permalink | Comments | Email This Story
    ]]>     battle-of-the-botnets http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20080422/185852921     Mon, 10 Sep 2007 13:03:00 PDT Do ISPs Ignore Security Researchers Who Point Out Zombied Machines? Mike Masnick http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20070910/021755.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20070910/021755.shtml botnets of "zombied" computers to run all sorts of scams and spam campaigns. ISPs have been somewhat slow to react. While they try to use fairly blunt instruments, like cutting off certain ports, many don't seem to have a very good process in place for tracking down and stopping customers whose machines have become unwitting members in a botnet. In fact, security researchers are growing frustrated that when they come across evidence of a hijacked computer, ISPs don't respond at all when told that a customer is causing trouble. There certainly are a few ISPs that are careful to help get rid of botnets, doing things like quarantining or cutting off certain users from their internet access until their machines are cleaned up, but most of the bigger ISPs don't appear to do very much at all. Of course, there is the other side of this story -- which is that when ISPs may be too proactive, it can often snag people whose machines aren't actually doing anything wrong. But, it certainly seems like completely ignoring reports with evidence of a botnet may be going to the opposite extreme.

    Permalink | Comments | Email This Story
    ]]>     not-such-a-good-thing http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20070910/021755