Scott Bennett wrote:
For those who are interested in seeing how little difference in principle
there is between the U.S. government of today and that of Stalin's U.S.S.R. of
yesterday, check out the article at
http://blog.wired.com/defense/2008/05/air-force-mater.html
which discusses the Air Force's desire to be able to take over any and every
computer on the net, regardless of where those computers may be. They want
not only to be able to take control of those computers, but also to be able
to install undetectable spyware.
Sure, I want to take over every computer on the net too...And by the way, so does the German Federal Police (BKA). Doesn't mean they can. Luckily there's always an antivirus-company outside of these countries' jurisdiction so any "Federal Spyware" would still be detected as exactly that: Spyware. No German, or U.S., law will stop Kaspersky from treating that thing as what it is. On the contrary, it's a good sales argument for Kaspersky ;)
I don't really think this is a threat to the average user or even criminal. If they were really going to use a Federal Virus of some sort, it would have to be custom-developed for each and every target so it won't be detected easily. And no government can afford to employ something that expensive on a larger scale.
At least I hope so. Andrew