Hearkening back to the Sony Rootkit brouhaha from a few years ago, a security researcher is claiming in a Network World article that he detected factory-installed keyloggers in two brand new Samsung Laptops. Samsung has made no official response, but a tech support supervisor contacted by the author said that the keystroke logging software was installed by Samsung to "monitor the performance of the machine and to find out how it is being used."
To view parent comment, click here.
To read all comments associated with this story, please click here.
Member since:2005-08-11
Uh, no...
The term rootkit originated in Unix systems, and Linux is not immune, the source of most rootkits in Unix\Linux is crackers who gain root access through normal means, mainly security holes in other software running on the system. The cracker then installs the rootkit himself, if the exploit he used allows him to gain root access. This allows him access even if the original exploit is fixed.
Spreading the same old crap that Unix\Linux is magically immune to these things doesn't help anybody, especially people who take your words to heart and then get burned.
Now on the other hand, they are much easier to detect in Linux\Unix, so I think a lot of the cracker types are falling back on the old standbys of replacing standard commands like login with trojans, which is easier to do, and if you do that to a bunch of commands, you can cover more bases.
RE[3]: Any free software to find rootkits and keyloggers?
Member since:2005-06-29
Please show me where in my post I said that *nixes are "magically immune" to malware? Oh that's right, I didn't.
You make a valid point, but you don't have to deliberately misquote me to make it. That's juvenile and makes you out to be less intelligent than you obviously are.
I stand by my original post, wherein I said the same thing as you: It's difficult but not impossible to infect a *nix box.
Member since:2010-07-17
It is *highly unlikely* that a Linux (or Unix or whatever) computer is/was compromised, as Samsung does not sell, AFAIK, a computer with Linux (except Android, but that's on smartphones), as this is a factory install, so they have root access anyway. Linux is not immune to rootkits, but it is to this one, as Samsung only sells Windows boxes.
Member since:2005-06-29
And that was pretty much my point; *nixes don't really ship with rootkits and such from the maintainer (though I think Fedora had an issue a while back with a compromised server). I thought it went without saying that Samsung in particular wouldn't be shipping compromised Linux installs.
At an event earlier today, Microsoft unveiled the next Xbox - the third model, but confusingly named Xbox One. The big focus was TV, integrated Kinect, and all the other stuff we all expected to be forced down our throats. I think it took them 25 minutes to actually come to what should be the core of the story: gaming. Nothing groundbreaking in the gaming department, except for how Microsoft intends to handle the used games market and borrowing games from friends: pay up, buddy!
The day has finally come! Jolla has finally announced the launch device for its Sailfish operating system - and by god this is a looker. It's decidedly different from other phones out there, but it has good specifications and carries a relatively reasonably price tag - EUR 399, and it's up for pre-order today, shipping in the fourth quarter of this year.
Why does Google get so much credit in the technology industry? Why, despite the company's many obvious failings, do many geeks and enthusiasts still hold a somewhat positive view on the all-knowing technology giant? A specific talk at Google I/O this week provides the answer.
OSNews is a sponsor of this year's O'Reilly OSCON in Portland, Oregon, USA. A lucky OSNews reader will win a free three-day pass, including two tutorials days. To win the pass, post a comment on this story saying something about Open Source Software or OSCON. We'll pick a winner at random next week. If you don't have an OSNews account, you may email us your entry. Part of the conference is the 9th annual Open Source Awards, and today the 16th is the deadline for nominations. If you'd like to nominate an outstanding open source contributor, do it here. Read on for more information about OSCON. Update: The 20% discount code for OSNews readers is "OSN."
"Windows is indeed slower than other operating systems in many scenarios, and the gap is worsening." That's one way to start an insider explanation of why Windows' performance isn't up to snuff. Written by someone who actually contributes code to the Windows NT kernel, the comment on Hacker News, later deleted but reposted with permission on Marc Bevand's blog, paints a very dreary picture of the state of Windows development. The root issue? Think of how Linux is developed, and you'll know the answer.
This is one of those news items that's fun to write, fun to read, fun to comment on, and where no one will be able to say anything unkind. It's all just one big ball of awesome fluffiness. TuneTracker, the BeOS radio automation software, has just released something very special: TuneTracker System 5, the first version designed entirely and specifically for Haiku. In fact, it actually includes Haiku in the software package. Better yet, TuneTracker also unveiled several system-in-a-box products - which have Haiku and TuneTracker pre-installed.
Exactly twenty years ago, a document was published that played a huge role in establishing the web as we know it today. Twenty years later, and this simple and straightforward document is proof of an irrefutable fact: while closed technologies can change markets, open technologies can change the world.Oh multitasking. That staple of computing that got thrown out the window with many modern smartphones. We got some rudimentary thing in its place - but even as multitasking on phone and tablets improves, its user-visible side remains cumbersome. Windows 8 has a neat implementation, and now it's time Android follows in it footsteps.They're here! Whether that excites you or not remains to be seen, but the Galaxy S4, which will most likely become the best selling Android smartphone of the year by a huge margin, has been reviewed by all the major sites, and there's lots of interesting conclusions in there - although I think most of you will get the gist.Nokia has posted its quarterly results for the first quarter of 2013, and just like the quarters that came before, there's not a whole lot of good news in there. The rise in Lumia sales still can't even dream of making up for the sales drop in Symbian phones, and when broken down in versions, the sales figures for Windows Phone 8 Lumias in particular are very disappointing. In North America, Nokia is getting slaughtered.
Member since:
2005-06-29
Does anybody know of any free software to find rootkits and keyloggers on Windows?
There are several out there; www.malwarehelp.org is a good resource to start from.
It's highly doubtful that any GNU/Linux or BSD distribution contains something like that, and it's very difficult (but not impossible) to infect such OSes with rootkits. It would depend on an absolutely moronic user (which is rare among the OSS using crowd), or on physical access to the hardware by the person wanting to install the rootkit. OS X is nearly as safe as other Unix-like OSes, and the more obscure OSes are virtually malware-free.
That said, it's easy to keep your Windows installation secure if you research the options available and don't visit shady parts of the internet. As one of my colleagues used to say, "If you sleep with a prostitute you catch the funk, why is it any different for a PC?"