At Fri, 17 Apr 2009 14:07:31 -0500 CentOS mailing list <centos at centos.org> wrote: > > On Fri, Apr 17, 2009 at 1:17 PM, Scott Silva <ssilva at sgvwater.com> wrote: > > on 4-17-2009 9:33 AM Lanny Marcus spake the following: > >> On Fri, Apr 17, 2009 at 11:25 AM, William L. Maltby > >> <CentOS4Bill at triad.rr.com> wrote: > >>> On Fri, 2009-04-17 at 11:13 -0500, Lanny Marcus wrote: > >>>> On Thu, Apr 16, 2009 at 11:14 PM, Michael A. Peters <mpeters-ee4meeAH724 at public.gmane.org> wrote: > >>>> <snip> > >>>>> My experience is that when browsing on any OS and you come across an > >>>>> error message stating that your computer is infected and you need to > >>>>> install such and such software, the web site I was visiting has an XSS > >>>>> exploit that was taken advantage of to try and get you to manually > >>>>> install a piece of malware. > >>>>> > >>>>> Install the FireFox extension "noscript" and be very careful about what > >>>>> domains you authorize scripting from. > >> > >> I now have NoScript installed. > >> > >> <snip> > >>> You might want to also check your preferences. FF has settings about > >>> warning about fraud sites etc. You also can affect the things that > >>> javascripts can do and suppress pop-ups. I've encountered those things > >>> that you mentioned and gotten no ill-effects since I just leave the site > >>> immediately. > >> > >> Bill: I will double check the Firefox configuration settings, since I > >> upgraded from CentOS 5.2 to 5.3, last Friday night. I need to be able > >> to visit that web site, so if anything bad is coming from it (without > >> the knowledge of the webmaster) I will hopefully avoid it, with the > >> NoScript Firefox extension which I just installed. Lanny > > > > Noscript will give you an idea of just how many sites run a script of some > > kind. You will see a large part of sites just look different when the scripts > > don't run, and some don't function at all. Not that it is a bad thing, it will > > just make you think a lot. > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > > CentOS mailing list > > CentOS at centos.org > > http://lists.centos.org/mailman/listinfo/centos > > > > > > Remember the NeXT step days (for me, mid 90's) when a single > executable binary file contained both intel and PowerPC/Motorola code. > When clicked, it would execute the intel code on the intel platform > and the PowerPC/Motorola code on the PowerPC/Motorola platform. I > think it would be cool to have Portable App executables that run under > both Linux and Windows because life would be easier, but the security > problem would be too much of a downside -- a single binary that roots > both Linux and Windows. There is something called a StarKit that can be used to encapsulate Tcl/Tk programs. The StarKit can be treated as an executable that will run on any machine with a suitable Tclkit installed. It is also possible to combine the Tclkit with the StarKit, creating a StarPack, which is a self-contained executable. > > It is easy to write an executable binary for Linux that ends in .exe - > so that is don't think that is any protection at all. Linux does not care about file *names*. A file is executable if its x bit is set AND it is recognized as an executable. That is one of: 1) file with the magic 'ELF' header (the # bits, bit order, and arch have to match what your kernel can deal with) 2) a Java jar file (if you have Java installed and configured for this usage) 3) a MS-Windows executable (if you have Wine installed AND the path is somewhere that maps to a MS-Windows drive AND Wine is configured for this usage) 4) an ASCII file with a '#!' as its first line and the path there names an executable file. MacOSX also supports 'universal binaries' (binaries that run on Intel or PowerPC processors). > > Clicking "Cancel" on these dialogs or X could still launch the > executable - safest thing to do would be to kill firefox. > > Further recommend NoScript and SiteAdvisor simultaneously. Recommend > against wine and even more so against the Internet Explorer > whatchamacallit for Firefox including on wine. > _______________________________________________ > CentOS mailing list > CentOS at centos.org > http://lists.centos.org/mailman/listinfo/centos > > -- Robert Heller -- 978-544-6933 Deepwoods Software -- Download the Model Railroad System http://www.deepsoft.com/ -- Binaries for Linux and MS-Windows heller at deepsoft.com -- http://www.deepsoft.com/ModelRailroadSystem/