BTW, Russian passport number you cite is wrong – Russia uses 4+6 (series+number) digit system for passports.

You can check whether given series and number correspond to a valid passport at http://services.fms.gov.ru/info-service.htm?sid=2000

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I think the best solution is to just stop their internet until the problem stops. If an ISP warns a person 3 times in 3 weeks to DO something about malware, and they don’t, then just don’t serve them internet. I don’t know how much clearer you can be to a person…

It would either cause a conscious shift in mentality for people to take responsibility for their computing, OR, would be a boon for IT shops.

We make people have licences to drive a car. While a computer has a hard time killing a person, malware has a huge detriment to the global economy and the current situation just isn’t working.

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But in most families, it’s not that type of one-time event. They’re always using IE, and they’re always executing Java, Javascript, Flash, the whole package. No one even knows it’s risky, because it’s the default setting for Windows. If there are no naked people, they probably don’t see it as doing anything really wrong, just goofing off. And the kids don’t connect the risky behavior to the malware. The first thing the trojans do is erase IE’s history, so you can’t tell what site infected you. It makes it hard to learn from experience.

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Your post highlights the fact that the monitors of legit sites have gotten lazy. They assume it can’t happen to them… Wrong

I apologize for over-simplifying the situation. Nevertheless, it is still valid to assert that almost all scuzzy sites have hidden malware and that anyone who visits them is at risk for acquiring malware. So if they do, IMO, they deserve what they get.

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I’d agree if the year were 1949. I remember getting up with the Summer sunrise, going out on my fat tired, Columbia bike and riding up and down my street waiting for some other kids to wake up and come out to play. We’d stay out all day… till we heard our Mothers ring the cowbell to come home for dinner. But it’s not 1949.

Kids today know a great deal more than we “knowledgeable” adults give them credit for. My 4th grade GS knows more about the Internet than his Dad, not that he’d cop to that, lol. Plus, ALL kids have a special Spidey Sense about when things are hinky. Are there exceptions? Sure. But mostly not.

So when you clean up your niece’s computer, know that the sweet little darlin’ knew what she was doing when she did what she did AND WILL DO IT AGAIN. You can lecture her all you want but it won’t do any good. She is immortal and untouchable (aren’t we all till death hits too close to home to ignore?) and besides, Uncle can fix anything that’s wrong.

The bottom line is that they’ve already learned how to get into trouble. It is your job as a loving uncle to help them learn how to get out. And the best tool in your box is the universal fear pre-teeners and teenagers have of embarrassment. You let them suffer it, and then you show them how to avoid it. If you just rescue them, then you’re just a codependent. “Tough Love” isn’t always bad… just when the “love” part is missing.

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“Since most of them caught their virus on scuzzy websites…”

Sorry, but that’s an extremely dated perspective on how malware spreads.

See for instance this 2009 InformationWeek article:
http://www.informationweek.com/news/internet/security/212901775

70 Of Top 100 Web Sites Spread Malware

“Advice to visit only legitimate Web sites appears to be meaningless as increasing numbers of mainstream sites contain known malicious code.

“Seventy percent of the top 100 Web sites either hosted malicious content or contained a link designed to redirect site visitors to a malicious Web site during the second half of 2008, claims Websense’s report State of Internet Security, Q3-Q4, 2008.”

Well-loved. Like or Dislike: 9  1