Back in 1999 Y2K was the big nightmare scenario. At the turn on the millennium all electronics that depended on internal clocks were going to go haywire, and it was imperative we get Y2K-compliant machines. Or, the ultimate nightmare scenario, all major electric-based infrastructures were going to collapse.
Some months ago a client called me in a panic, saying we weren't prepared for the DNS Redirector conspiracy that was sure to cripple how we use the Internet and plumb international secrets.
At least a few times a year the media exclaims about some new bug or other malware that's bound to have infected most of the nation's computers, and is bound to activate any day now.
So the question is, do you see me running? Do you see any IT experts running? If we're not, it's probably not a bomb.
The worst news is the best news
The media, as an entity, thrives on viewership. And nobody tunes in when "all is well." People only pay attention when things aren't functioning properly, when things have gone wrong. A knee-jerk reaction is still a reaction, and it's far more effective to use scare tactics and let people cool off after than to rationally present information.
So anytime there's even the most remote instance of something being worthy of note, there will be news of it. And it will spread. Did anything happen at the crack of the year 2000? No, but the possibility of something happening was newsworthy.
Conspiracy theory
Is the dread DNS Redirector conspiracy going to cripple how we use the Internet? Will it redirect all of our Web browsing and bring us to our knees by keeping us from Facebook? Yes, viruses can and have been known to do that. I've had to alleviate some client terminals of those.
But is there a vast conspiracy to bring down nations with them? Not likely. The closest we have to those are botnets, and those are more often used to send out spam or at worst execute DDoS attacks where directed. But the malware behind those botnets is designed to remain hidden, and rigging their host's DNS services would utterly give them away.
Even giving the conspiracy theory a nod, a botnet would be used against a government/organization by virtue of its vast computing power to make more effective hacking attempts. Again, redirecting our DNS would only give away the malware's presence, thus giving the user incentive to remove it -- and thus remove their machine from the botnet, depriving it of that additional resource.
Lastly a DNS redirector would only affect the World Wide Web. Not the entire Internet. The Web uses DNS, domain name systems, to route information. It is a system that keep tracks of aliases, nothing more. So does this affect IP addresses, or systems that directly use those? No. So if it begins in http://www there might be an issue. But that, the Web, all the hyperlinked content, only makes up about 10% of the whole Internet! The rest is comprised of email (SMTP), FTP, instant messaging, UseNet, and much more.
No monsters, but still beasts
Is all of this to mean that I can run around on the Web without anti-malware programs, downloading at whim? That I can trust every email I receive with impunity? Of course not. Sensational headlines are scare tactics, but they only sound convincing because there are the occasional actual worst-case scenarios.
Rootkits exist, and they hunker down beyond the means of most anti-programs. Keyloggers are insidious things. And the worst are zero-day exploits, those are incredibly hard to defend against. When a zero-day exploit hits, computer techs scramble. A zero-day is akin to getting caught with your pants down; you weren't even aware of that vulnerability until it was already exploited. Those are the real beasts, because we can't prepare for them.
International hacking is on the rise. There was Stuxnet in Iran. And multiple intrusions into Google and U.S. agencies that have been traced to China. "Cyber warfare" is a real and growing threat. But is an online "Red Dawn" going to happen? I don't think so, I certainly don't hope so, but I can't completely rule it out.
So until I see the rest of the IT community running, I'm going to sit right here, make sure my firewalls and anti-malware software are up to date, and enjoy looking around on Tumblr.
What are some of your favorite Web-related news panics?