Truth About Computer Security Hysteria
The stench of a new trend
Rob Rosenberger, Vmyths co-founderThursday, 8 June 2000 "IN A REACTION to concerns raised by the outbreak of email attachment viruses," a press release began, "Math Strategies has withdrawn its award-winning Personal CatchTheWeb from the market." Can you believe it? An award-winning product went down the tubes because some company fears computer viruses. I imagine a VP stood up at a board meeting and proclaimed "we here at Math Strategies contribute to the worldwide virus problem." Hear, hear! Such a VP must be hung like the guys at Starlabs — a man's man, if you know what I mean.
Corporate suicide! "Math Strategies has withdrawn its award-winning Personal CatchTheWeb from the market" because of the ILoveYou virus. Their own press release says so.Few firms have the, uh, guts to slash their corporate wrists for the good of the Internet. As we say in America, Math Strategies "leaned into the strike zone and took one for the team." Bravo! Of course, one wonders what took the company so long to revoke its product in the name of Internet safety. "The outbreak of email attachment viruses" started years ago. It amaz-- {sniff} Say, do I smell a new trend? Aha. Math Strategies recently morphed from a shareware firm to an Internet application service provider. And ILoveYou presented them with a PR opportunity. This little incident reminds me of an "emergency recall" press release during the height of February's hacker attacks:
CCS International, Ltd. and The Counter Spy Shops are issuing an emergency recall of [three] Hacker Trap (TM) models. The President and Attorney General of the United States have effectively declared a virtual 'state of emergency' for threats to e-commerce, and the integrity of our worldwide communication and data transfer systems. This virtual 'state of emergency' threatening the business and financial communities and the privacy of American business worldwide has brought to the forefront the reality that THE HACKER CANNOT BE STOPPED! There is no place to hide except for the newly upgraded HACKER TRAP(TM) SECURELINE-800 with...You get the hint. The press release went on to describe new features, unique technologies, proprietary encryption algorithms, blah blah blah. {sniff} Yeah, it smells like a new trend to me. I wonder what will happen to MathStrategies.com when they recognize the dangers of domain hijacking?