The FBI Might Cut Off the Internet For Millions of People on March 8th

[Oneironaut Zero]

The FBI Might Cut Off the Internet For Millions of People on March 8th Hmm. Good to know?

[Supernova]

TBH, the article is a little ambiguous. I went to dcwg.org, though, and ran ipconfig through a DOS shell with the "/all" parameter, but couldn't find the DNS-related information they were referring to. EDIT: scrath that, I found the IP for my DNS. Looks like I'm clean.

[Marvo]

That's a pretty clever way of going about it.

[mcwillis]

Im clean as a whistle after having a look.

[Forsaken]

Misleading sensationalist title is misleading. Put simply, the "dns changer" worm changed the network configuration settings of victim machines so that they would use a dns server under the control of criminals, with the result being that they could then intercept and modify, log, or simply deny the victim's access to anything they wanted. The fbi took over the the addresses that the criminal's dns servers used, and put benevolent "surrogate" servers in their place. They have no intention of operating the surrogate dns servers indefinitely, and when they shut them down, people infected with the dns changer worm will 'lose internet access' not because the fbi 'shut down their internet', but because their computer is looking to a dead dns server for domain resolution. Personally, I think they should not have set up the surrogate servers at all, since a lot of people won't be able to get their heads around the situation, and will put the blame on the wrong party when the surrogates are eventually taken offline. Those that 'lose internet' will have lost it because they got pwned, not because of any fbi action or inaction.

[Supernova]

Misleading sensationalist title is misleading. Put simply, the "dns changer" worm changed the network configuration settings of victim machines so that they would use a dns server under the control of criminals, with the result being that they could then intercept and modify, log, or simply deny the victim's access to anything they wanted. The fbi took over the the addresses that the criminal's dns servers used, and put benevolent "surrogate" servers in their place. They have no intention of operating the surrogate dns servers indefinitely, and when they shut them down, people infected with the dns changer worm will 'lose internet access' not because the fbi 'shut down their internet', but because their computer is looking to a dead dns server for domain resolution. Personally, I think they should not have set up the surrogate servers at all, since a lot of people won't be able to get their heads around the situation, and will put the blame on the wrong party when the surrogates are eventually taken offline. Those that 'lose internet' will have lost it because they got pwned, not because of any fbi action or inaction. Thanks for clarifying. Did they think to do something along the lines of setting up those surrogate servers to redirect users to a page explaining what's going on and how to fix it?

[Forsaken]

Thanks for clarifying. Did they think to do something along the lines of setting up those surrogate servers to redirect users to a page explaining what's going on and how to fix it? That would be a very good idea, but no, I don't think they've done that. Although it should be a relatively simple thing for them to implement. A lot of fake antivirus malware infects people using scary messages about non-existent infections though, so a lot of people might be too paranoid to heed the warning. :p Though I guess people savvy to tricks like that wouldn't be infected in the first place, or would already know it and have cleaned it up if they had this dns changer worm.

[tommo]

Could they just sell those servers to ISP's? So they don't have to bother getting rid of the virus on everyone's computers? I really don't know anything about DNS.

[Forsaken]

Could they just sell those servers to ISP's? So they don't have to bother getting rid of the virus on everyone's computers? I really don't know anything about DNS. Google or OpenDNS or similar might yet adopt the addresses, we'll see I guess.

[b12]

I'm safe! Thanks DCWG.org. I'd be interested to learn if anyone on here is infected, and if so, what happens to them.

[DeletePlease]

I'd be interested to learn if anyone on here is infected, and if so, what happens to them. Tupac returns from the dead and claims your soul in the name of Hades.