Thanks for that Nick I should mention that the Click presenter interviewed on The World Today did say that following the test in which spam was sent to the BBC's addresses, the owners of the compromised Windows PCs would be informed. Presumably by a mail not marked as spam ;-)
Journalists will always want to be concise especially in broadcast media and in my opinion it would be far more precise and informative to substitute "Windows PCs" for "PCs" in the statement, since there are no OSX or GNU/Linux botnets and the scourge of Windows botnets has less to do with the "popularity" of the platform and much more to do with its poor architecture and policies (browser tightly coupled to operating system, ActiveX, root-equivalent administrative rights, lack of support for older more vulnerable systems, etc.) Sean On Fri, Mar 13, 2009 at 11:30 AM, Nick Reynolds-FM&T <nick.reyno...@bbc.co.uk> wrote: > Indeed I can give you the BBC statement: > > "There is a powerful public interest in demonstrating the ease with > which such malware can be obtained and used; how it can be deployed on > thousands of PCs without the owners even knowing it is there; and its > power to send spam email or attack other websites undetected. This will > help computer users realise the importance and value of using basic > security techniques to defend their PCs from such attacks. > > The BBC has strict editorial guidelines for this type of investigation > which were followed to the letter. At no stage was any other data other > than the IP address used. We believe that as a result of the > investigation, computer users around the world are now better informed > of the importance and value of using basic security techniques to defend > their PCs from attacks" > > -----Original Message----- > From: owner-backst...@lists.bbc.co.uk > [mailto:owner-backst...@lists.bbc.co.uk] On Behalf Of Nick Reynolds-FM&T > Sent: 13 March 2009 10:16 > To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk > Subject: RE: [backstage] BBC becomes the British Botnet Corporation > > I can confirm this programme was run past the legal and policy people. > > -----Original Message----- > From: owner-backst...@lists.bbc.co.uk > [mailto:owner-backst...@lists.bbc.co.uk] On Behalf Of Rob Myers > Sent: 13 March 2009 09:30 > To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk > Subject: Re: [backstage] BBC becomes the British Botnet Corporation > > On Fri, Mar 13, 2009 at 8:35 AM, Steve Jolly <st...@jollys.org> wrote: > >> Not sure I'm convinced - all operating systems have their >> vulnerabilities; > > All machines have their *theoretical* vulnerabilities. Only Windows has > vast botnets built on them, or any effective malware threats exploiting > them in the wild. > > Unless you are a BBC reporter who has only ever used Windows, you're on > a deadline, and you don't want your report to look like it lacks > balance. In which case suddenly every OS is as good as Windows for a > change. ;-) > > - Rob. > - > Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, > please visit > http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. > Unofficial list archive: > http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/ > > - > Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, > please visit > http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. > Unofficial list archive: > http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/ > > - > Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please > visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. > Unofficial list archive: > http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/ > - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/
