The Nimda Hype
from the yeah,-it-sucked,-but-calm-down dept
Yes. The Nimda virus sucked if you needed to spend all day yesterday cleaning it up and patching your machines. Yes, it caused trouble, and some servers to be a bit slow. However, that still didn’t warrant all the ridiculous hype news organizations made about it. People were being told to stay off the internet because of it. Here’s a good article looking at exactly how overhyped Nimda was. Don’t you think the Attorney General of the US has more important things to do this week then explain why the virus/worm has nothing to do with terrorists?
Comments on “The Nimda Hype”
Code Blue/ Nimda
I feel that it is important for the news to report these viruss. They are a danger to businesses. I know that the latest viruss to hit are not targeted at the home user the ARE targeted at the business and ecommerce systems ( you know the ones that make $$). It is very important, even if over hyped, to let users know that when they go to work DON”T CLICK ON ATTACHEMENTS unless you know that they are clean.
I am surprised at how many people don’t realize how bad these viruss really are and the impact they can have on business. It is estimated that the Code Red virus caused 2.4 million dollars in damages to the business industry (not the home user). Who is going to pay for these costs. It is said that the Code Blue damage will be worse.
My (very small)ISP got the virus yesterday and here is his summation:
this is far more vicious than the code red, and a lot of servers were infected and damaged. we were able to bring most of our service back up, but a large number of web servers were still lined up for repair, and we will probably have a couple of those 2-hour-sleep days.
My office did not get the virus but we were being pingged all day and it slowed down our productivity. In fact, one of our secretaries went to the FAO Schwartz web site to look at toys. FAO had the virus which in turn opened a pop-under window to a web site and started downloading the virus onto our system.
These viruss are eventually going to have an impact on our economy and could effectively freeze up our internet backbone at a time we may NEED IT IN THESE CRUCIAL WEEKS AHEAD.
Additionally, more and more users are upgrading to Windows 2000 at home. You will be at risk and you can pass it on.
I say report as much as they will. Everone needs to understand the promlem here.
For those of you who would like to be more educated on the issues of viruss and how they effect business systems please refer to symantecs virus information site at:
http://www.sarc.com
Thank you for the vent.
Scott
Re: Code Blue/ Nimda
If people don’t know by now not to click on attachments, sending out another barrage of hype about a virus isn’t going to help. People have been saying it for years.
My problem with the coverage is simply the nature of it. The “this is the end of the world – get off the internet”. That’s useless. If you manage systems, and these things are important to you, you should be on the various lists that will alert you to those things.
I realize that the virus itself was a big deal – my complaint is just with the coverage.
And, as for SARC, they’ve been known to grossly overhype viruses themselves in the past – talking about viruses that weren’t even out there. They make money selling anti-virus software. I’m more willing to trust a more neutral party that doesn’t rely on hype and scares to build their business.
Re: Re: Code Blue/ Nimda
See this article, which I wrote some weeks back in response to the Code Red hysteria
Re: Re: Re: Code Blue/ Nimda
Thanks Jim. That’s a great article and describes exactly what I’ve been trying to say in a much better way than I could have said it.