Malware, spam prompts mass net turn off

[R.A. Hettinga]

<http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/01/14/malware_mass_net_turn_off/print.html>

The Register


 Biting the hand that feeds IT

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 Original URL:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/01/14/malware_mass_net_turn_off/

Malware, spam prompts mass net turn off
By Andrew Orlowski in San Francisco (andrew.orlowski at theregister.co.uk)
Published Friday 14th January 2005 10:12 GMT

Both beginners and veterans are finding the Interweb experience so
repellent that they're disconnecting in droves, blaming malware and spam.
Despite an overall increase in numbers of humans connected to the internet,
the mass turn-off is beginning to hit ecommerce in the United States.

"Instead of making life easier - the essential promise of technologies
since the steam engine - the home PC of late has made some users feel
stupid, endangered or just hassled beyond reason," writes Joe Menn, who
penned the definitive book on the Napster phenomenon, in a must-read
feature
(http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-fedup14jan14,0,111456.story?coll=la-home-headlines)
for the Los AngelesTimes.

Gee. And we thought everyone was joining the 'blogosphere' - melding into
one enormous global hive mind. Clearly, something is spoiling this happy
picture.

Although overall internet usage is increasing, ecommerce has felt the brunt
of the mass turn-off, as newcomers find the net is less than they expected,
and veterans decide that being connected is no longer tolerable.

The Times cites a survey in which almost a third of online shoppers are
buying less than they used to because of security worries. Despite the US
broadband boom, the number of online shoppers rose only one per cent last
year.

Menn also suggests why. A recent survey reckoned 80 per cent of PCs are
infected by malware. The speed with which an unprotected labs was infected
- just four minutes
(http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/12/01/honeypot_test/) - bears that out.
And there's little sign of respite. Malware authors are creating 150
zombies a week
(http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/01/05/mcafee_avert_report/).

Now comes the hard part. Mired deep in New Age gloop, California's internet
evangelists can't even see the problem, let alone suggest a solution. Into
this intellectual vacuum, draconian solutions - almost all of which involve
compromising the end-to-end principles that have allowed so much malware to
flourish - seem likely to find favor with fed-up net users.

Over two years ago we speculated that lock-down solutions such as Palladium
and TCPA, or safe, private nets may one day be welcomed as a solution to
the internet's tragedy of the commons. This looks more likely than ever.

Self-healing, it ain't. .

-- 
-----------------
R. A. Hettinga <mailto: rah at ibuc.com>
The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/>
44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
"... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity,
[predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to
experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'