retrocomputing

4126 readers

31 users here now

Discussions on vintage and retrocomputing

founded 1 year ago

MODERATORS

Idle Windows XP and 2000 machines get infected with viruses within minutes of being exposed online — legacy OSes compromised by just connecting to the Internet (www.tomshardware.com)

submitted 6 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

13 comments fedilink hide all child comments

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] Peffse 30 points 6 months ago (3 children)

I wonder how many people still directly connect to the internet without a gateway. It seems sensational to say "INSTANTLY INFECTED" and then tiny print (in a way that nobody connects to the internet since 1999). But maybe I'm just ignorant to how large a market still use direct connection.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I doubt many people would do that. You would have to intentionally set it up that way. Residential ISPs almost always supply a modem with a built in router which will have a firewall. You would have to set it to bridge mode, enable the DMZ, or use your own modem.

I haven't connected a computer directly to the internet since I used dial-up.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I remember back in the days of broadband being brand new. Comcast insisted that you had to pay for each device that connected to the Internet. Using a router was considered against the TOS.

I do not miss those days.

[–] ThatKomputerKat 5 points 6 months ago

We had a router hooked up to our first RCA cable modem on Comcast, but then we were only comcast customers because they bought the company that originally hooked us up.

cable Companies though. Don’t miss cable internet at all. Fuck Comcast any decade.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 6 months ago (1 children)

The takeaway I think they were trying to give was that the same experiments done on a more modern OS does not have these same "instant" infections (they reference having windows 7 under the same conditions without any issue)

[–] Peffse 11 points 6 months ago

What are they going to write about next, the dangers of unsigned drivers and how easily they infect Windows 98? lol

[–] TORFdot0 3 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I saw someone suggest they connect their switch dock directly to the internet elsewhere on Lemmy. Granted the attack surface for a switch is basically non existent but if people are suggesting that then certainly people are still connecting their other machines directly to their modems/CPEs as well

[–] Peffse 6 points 6 months ago (1 children)

That would be Nintendo themselves. The fools recommend port forwarding everything to the Switch.

How to Set Up a Router's Port Forwarding for a Nintendo Switch Console

[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

It’s not a DMZ, at Nintendo we say your Switch is now in Donkey Kong Country