Who writes VIRUS programs ?
Who makes a profit from it ?

Any chance it could be those who sell the ANTI VIRUS software ?
Just a thought!!

73 Al Lowe N0IMW

Anything which increases traffic volume benefits Internet service providers.

=====================================

Who writes VIRUS programs ?
Who makes a profit from it ?

Any chance it could be those who sell the ANTI VIRUS software ?
Just a thought!!

73 Al Lowe N0IMW

On 23 Apr 2004 16:48:40 GMT, (Arrow146) wrote:

Who writes VIRUS programs ?

High School kids mostly (or their emotional equivalent).

Who makes a profit from it ?

Big ego boost - money can't buy that.

Any chance it could be those who sell the ANTI VIRUS software ?
Just a thought!!

They can't afford to pay teenagers to do it.

In article ,
Arrow146 wrote:

Who writes VIRUS programs ?
Who makes a profit from it ?

Any chance it could be those who sell the ANTI VIRUS software ?
Just a thought!!

That thought has been raised by numerous people, over the past couple
of decades (ever since MS-DOS viruses began to be a significant
problem).

I've never heard anyone put forth *any* credible evidence at all,
which indicated that the commercial anti-virus-software companies or
programmers had had anything to do with writing or releasing the
viruses.

Based on what I can see, the motives behind virus and trojanwriting a

- Ego and bragging rights. Releasing a virus which spreads widely and
gets a lot of visibility in the press provides the author(s) with a
sense of importance.

At the moment, there seems to be an ongoing battle between the
authors of two or three of the currently-most-active virus/worm
families. They're actually releasing viruses or worms which [1]
contain code to identify, and remove their rivals' viruses, and [2]
contain bragging "We're the best, they're all losers!" statements
embedded in the code.

- Spamming ability. Quite a few of the more recent viruses, worms,
and trojan horses contain software which installs specialized
email-processing software and web/email/TCP proxy servers. A large
percentage (half or more, I've heard) of the spam flooding the
Internet is now being sent through home PCs on DSL and cable-modem
networks, which have been compromised by these viruses. Previous
spam-fighting efforts had succeeded in shutting down many of the
open email relays, and poorly-installed open proxy servers that the
spammers had been abusing, and it's widely believed that major
spam-gangs have commissioned virus-authors to implement these viral
mail relays. The motive, in this case, is profit: spammers can
flood millions of people with spam at almost no cost, and even a
handful of sales can earn them enough money to be worth the effort.


--
Dave Platt AE6EO
Hosting the Jade Warrior home page: http://www.radagast.org/jade-warrior
I do _not_ wish to receive unsolicited commercial email, and I will
boycott any company which has the gall to send me such ads!

Nope, absolutely incorrect. I work at an ISP, and with very few
exceptions, we get the same money regardless of the traffic. It is
therefore in our best interest to minimize traffic. This is a cutthroat
business, and no one can raise prices without losing customers.

tom
K0TAR

Reg Edwards wrote:

Anything which increases traffic volume benefits Internet service providers.

=====================================

"Reg Edwards" wrote in message
...
Anything which increases traffic volume benefits Internet service
providers.

Uhm no... If a normal customer is using more bandwidth (receiving and
sending more email, committing virus controlled DDoS attacks, etc) Internet
service providers LOSE MONEY. They pay by the byte, you don't. Most
customers pay a flat fee for internet access. This is true of most Cable,
DSL, ISDN, and Dial-up setups... they are priced based on an expectation of
'normal' usage, and the ISP loses money in 'extreme' usage cases. Why I ( a
'power user') get nasty emails from ISP's and have to switch often.... this
one is good about that though.

Close, but not quite.

An ISP will buy pipes, such as a DS3 that does 45Mbps, for a flat rate
per month. Theoretically the upstream provider doesn't care if 1 bps or
45 Mbps are passing through that pipe; from a billing perspective, they
get the same money. But they have to play the statistical game on how
much upstream pipe that they need to handle all the 45Mbps pipes they
sold to ISPs like you. And eventually you get to the backbone
providers, who have really really big pipes, and very expensive routers.

This "power user" thing is something I've never heard anyone in the
business speak of, so I have no idea why you would get bumped. If you
are not breaking the TOS agreement, ISPs don't care a rat's rear end how
much traffic you generate. You buy a pipe from the ISP and you have
every right to fill it if you can. The only exception to that would be
that you have a maximum number of hours or bytes per month. They won't
kick you if you exceed it, they just charge you an additional amount
that you agreed to in your contract with them. Some ISPs may do it a
bit differently, but that's fairly normal in the industry.

tom
K0TAR

Tyas_MT wrote:

"Reg Edwards" wrote in message
...

Anything which increases traffic volume benefits Internet service

providers.

Uhm no... If a normal customer is using more bandwidth (receiving and
sending more email, committing virus controlled DDoS attacks, etc) Internet
service providers LOSE MONEY. They pay by the byte, you don't. Most
customers pay a flat fee for internet access. This is true of most Cable,
DSL, ISDN, and Dial-up setups... they are priced based on an expectation of
'normal' usage, and the ISP loses money in 'extreme' usage cases. Why I ( a
'power user') get nasty emails from ISP's and have to switch often.... this
one is good about that though.

And I forgot to mention that almost all our customers are of the
unlimited type, so we don't don't monitor their traffic rate, or amount.

tom
K0TAR

Tom Ring wrote:

Close, but not quite.

An ISP will buy pipes, such as a DS3 that does 45Mbps, for a flat rate
per month. Theoretically the upstream provider doesn't care if 1 bps or
45 Mbps are passing through that pipe; from a billing perspective, they
get the same money. But they have to play the statistical game on how
much upstream pipe that they need to handle all the 45Mbps pipes they
sold to ISPs like you. And eventually you get to the backbone
providers, who have really really big pipes, and very expensive routers.

This "power user" thing is something I've never heard anyone in the
business speak of, so I have no idea why you would get bumped. If you
are not breaking the TOS agreement, ISPs don't care a rat's rear end how
much traffic you generate. You buy a pipe from the ISP and you have
every right to fill it if you can. The only exception to that would be
that you have a maximum number of hours or bytes per month. They won't
kick you if you exceed it, they just charge you an additional amount
that you agreed to in your contract with them. Some ISPs may do it a
bit differently, but that's fairly normal in the industry.

tom
K0TAR

Tom Ring wrote:
This "power user" thing is something I've never heard anyone in the
business speak of, so I have no idea why you would get bumped. If you
are not breaking the TOS agreement, ISPs don't care a rat's rear end how
much traffic you generate. You buy a pipe from the ISP and you have
every right to fill it if you can.

Yes, and the ISP has the right to simply stop offering you service as well.

BTW, the same thing happens with cell phone usage... many plans now have
'unlimited minutes,' but in actuality your usage is tracked and people who
use far, FAR more minutes than the average are usually sent warnings letters
or politely told that the provider no longer wishes to offer them service.

Tom Ring wrote:
And I forgot to mention that almost all our customers are of the
unlimited type, so we don't don't monitor their traffic rate, or amount.

Are you offering dial-up service only, or cable modem/DSL services?

Where I live, cable modem users get well over a megabit per second of
bandwidth, and someone filling that connection 24 hours a day is going to
make a noticeable mark in the ISP's overall bandwidth usage.