I was astonished at a statement by Melih Abdulhayoglu posted at The Tech Herald and a video in which Comodo’s CEO commended the BBC for controlling 22,000 users computers during their experiment with a botnet.
It’s taxpayers money well spent.
Well done, BBC!
We applaud BBC
Is anyone in their PR department awake at the helm.
Certifiedbug, March 17, 2009. Auntie Beeb visits with botnet
eWeeK: The British Botnet Corporation
There are some things you just don’t do in security research or you become part of the problem. Controlling and modifying other people’s machines, even if they are “bots” in a botnet, is one of them. This is what the BBC did.
Alex Eckelberry: The BBC botnet debacle
Malware researchers routinely deal with botnets for analysis purposes. It would be considered a high crime indeed to allow a spambot to actually send spam to the outside world, even for “testing” purposes. And, shutting down a botnet yourself, even with the best intentions, is simply not a good idea. You don’t know what accidental harm you may cause. You don’t really know what’s on the user’s system that will simply restart the whole process.
Well said.
http://certifiedbug.com/blog/tag/botnet/
BBC License
http://www.bbc.co.uk/complaints/
Update
ESET Threat Blog: Comodo Backs BBC against AV
Abdulhayoglu is entitled to his opinion, of course. I wonder, though, whether mainstream companies who planned on attending a security forum organized by Comodo later this month will now be considering whether they can afford to be seen to align with such radical views on the need to conform with the rule of law and, arguably, its own guidelines on what is acceptable in terms of conducting business with criminals?
The Register: BBC botnet ‘public interest’ defence rubbished by top IT lawyer V for Vigilante
