Has there been any known viruses?

[carlwill]

I am surfing the web free as a bird laughing when I see Firefox pop up saying can't install shlongloader.exe or what have you...but I am scared about things that I don't see on the back end? Are there any known worms or virus issues I would or should be aware of? I know mydoom came back and threw down works entire Exhange environment but my schools send mail servers were up like a champ. Just trying to keep myself informed.

[marzugal]

If you are not sure try chkrootkit and rkhunter both good rootkit checkers

[backroger]

Hmmm....

This is a good article to read "Linux vs. Windows Viruses"

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2003/10/06/linux_vs_windows_viruses/

I am surfing the web free as a bird laughing when I see Firefox pop up saying can't install shlongloader.exe or what have you...but I am scared about things that I don't see on the back end? Are there any known worms or virus issues I would or should be aware of? I know mydoom came back and threw down works entire Exhange environment but my schools send mail servers were up like a champ. Just trying to keep myself informed.

[fast sjonny]

Very interesting article, thanks ;)

One question, which is probably not belonging in this topic, but came up after reading;
I am using excel and word documents on my system. Would it be better to use the programs default extension instead of those Windows extensions, just because of safety?
The problem then is it is not as easy to share the files with Windows-users without converting them.
But is it a security risque or not?

Jan

[crackers]

No more a security risk than using Oowriter for any other document - which, if you're not running as root, is close to nil. Keep in mind that Windows vulnerabilities, while they may be triggered by "infected" documents, will not affect non-Windows programs using the same documents. Writing a cross-platform virus/worm/whatever that can successfully compromise multiple OS's through infected documents is quite a daunting task.

[w5set]

Usually Excel Macros won't run/do much inside OpenOffice. Only the basic formattimg-etc will be imported and run sucessfully. Visual Basic Macro's inside Excel don't seem to have any luck at all actually getting anywhere, as was said--they are OS dependent.

[Jman]

The imporant thing is to keep updating so the vulnerabilities can't be exploited. This advice works on any operating system.

[Woad_Warrior]

the last i heard, there were maybe 3 viruses written for linux some time ago that had a very limited impact. as far as wintendo viruses go, about the only way to get some of them to work on linux at all is using something like wine (with any files (such as dll's) that a particular virus needs) or vmware (with a win install)
shlongloader.exe sounds like something you'd get from a porn site. you're not surfing them are you? ;) (just kidding)

[LiNuX-CrUsAdEr]

Malicous attacks, infection, etc. intended for Windows OS will not work for any other OS indeed. However, file sharing with windows-based hosts makes your machine a gateway to hell. I suggest that you have a anti-virus installed on you linux box if ever you are sharing files with windows-based hosts. If not, I think properly patching your box would be enough. You can try Bitdefender Anti-Virus for Linux, it's free! :)

[backroger]

Here another one...how about "Running Windows viruses with Wine"

http://os.newsforge.com/article.pl?sid=05/01/25/1430222&from=rss

[thebigsam]

there was one virus in 97 it was called bliss, it blissfully kealed over lol. It wasnt to serious and died out. It only effected those logged in as root, which of course is stupid to do if ur going onlline anyway!