“Of all the sinister things that Internet viruses do, this might be the worst: They can make you an unsuspecting collector of child pornography,” Jordan Robertson reports for The Associated Press.
“Heinous pictures and videos can be deposited on computers by viruses — the malicious programs better known for swiping your credit card numbers. In this twist, it’s your reputation that’s stolen,” Robertson reports. “Pedophiles can exploit virus-infected PCs to remotely store and view their stash without fear they’ll get caught. Pranksters or someone trying to frame you can tap viruses to make it appear that you surf illegal Web sites.”
“Whatever the motivation, you get child porn on your computer — and might not realize it until police knock at your door,” Robertson reports. “An Associated Press investigation found cases in which innocent people have been branded as pedophiles after their co-workers or loved ones stumbled upon child porn placed on a PC through a virus. It can cost victims hundreds of thousands of dollars to prove their innocence.”
“In the first publicly known cases of individuals being victimized, two men in the United Kingdom were cleared in 2003 after viruses were shown to have been responsible for the child porn on their PCs,” Robertson reports. “In one case, an infected e-mail or pop-up ad poisoned a defense contractor’s PC and downloaded the offensive pictures. In the other, a virus changed the home page on a man’s Web browser to display child porn, a discovery made by his 7-year-old daughter. The man spent more than a week in jail and three months in a halfway house, and lost custody of his daughter.”
“Ned Solon of Casper, Wyoming is serving six years for child porn found in a folder used by a file-sharing program on his computer,” Robertson reports. “Solon admits he used the program to download video games and adult porn — but not child porn… ‘Computers are not to be trusted,’ says Jeremiah Grossman, founder of WhiteHat Security Inc. He describes it as ‘painfully simple’ to get a computer to download something the owner doesn’t want — whether it’s a program that displays ads or one that stores illegal pictures.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Good thing you “saved” $69 on that shiteous Dell laptop instead of getting that Apple MacBook you really wanted, Skippy.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Readers “sparkplug” and “Cubert” for the heads up.]
I asked a question of a former colleague of mine who, as a cop, had done some investigations of this kind of material. I explained my situation – my wife is an MD, and works, among other things, with pediatric SA cases. There are diagnostic texts and CD that she owns which feature some rather graphic imagery. I asked if, since possession of this material is prima facie evidence of a crime, I was living under some risk.
His response was, and wasn’t, reassuring – that it’s all about the context; in this case, it was clearly part of a legitimate professional education curriculum, so no problem.
I just hate that it’s left as a contextual decision. Some crazy DA gets a wild hair about something, and I could have to spring for thousands in lawyers to prove our innocence, not to mention damage to my reputation.
“Unless this isn’t America, last I checked guilt has to be proven, not innocence.”
there is an entire prison full of people who beg to differ with you on that. Thanks gitmo!
After reading this article, I finally decided to do this:
http://usm.maine.edu/computing/roadrunner/routercfg.jsp
I know, I know – should’ve been done before. But damn iPhones seem to have a difficult time staying connected so I always remove it.
@ Figurative:
Do you practice at being a dick, or does it come naturally?
@ anthony007
“Unless this isn’t America, last I checked guilt has to be proven, not innocence.”
That is a huge misconception that Americans have.
iPhoner,
What you finally did is all good, but it really has absolutely no effect on the substance of this story. A Windows computer connected to your router would still be a target for a trojan or a virus with child porn.
this is some sick fscking shit (and im no prude). now every asshole pedophile can claim a virus got on their computer. whoever is responsible for this should be killed, and i fully mean it. do people not understand the suffering that these children endure for the rest of their life? why should we as a society tolerate this crap? anybody who is anti-capital punishment deserves to be kicked in the gonads.
eSemen
According the the various “forensics-heavy” TV shows I watch, it is possible to extract origin tags from computer files – they can tell a) where they came from and b) what caused them to be moved. OK, chances are pretty good that these searches a “possible”, I’m sure they are neither “easy” nor “inexpensive”. Which means if someone finds the files on your computer, YOU will have to get a hacker-type to discover how they got there – that you are innocent. Which would mean YOU would pay for the investigation.
IF you could find a hacker the court will accept as an “Expert Witness”.
@ anthony007
“Unless this isn’t America, last I checked guilt has to be proven, not innocence.”
Except in sexual assalt cases, especially those involving kids. “He touched me” can never really be proven. So we bend the burden of proof a bit to see justice done. If a few innocent people go to jail and spend the rest of their lives on sex offender lists, oh well.
Well deserved… hope many of them go to jail
…after all that these morons have done to the Internet and computing in general for decades, by buying Windblows (outmyass) PeeeeCeeees…. assmonkeys, too cheap and dumb to buy a real computer.
Wow… thieves using Windows to steal millions from companies and now this. This should scare everyone the fuck off of Windows AND from torrents type file sharing.
Pedophiles will be using YOUR computer to store their contraband. And once the files are discovered on your machine, just how the f do you prove you didn’t know.
This has gone waaaaay beyond the virus makes computer unusable, destroys data, etc.
NO WONDER Mac sales keep growing.
If you can’t afford a mac get a used one.
If you can’t afford that get Linux.
@iPhoner, the best thing is to not use the most common and hackable wireless router in existence.
We mac users are gay. We have no interest in kids, everybody knows that.
MW = girls.
go figure
@G4Dualie,
@ Anthony007–
Naive much? It’s your guilt that needs to be proven by the word of the law, but it’s your innocence that needs to be proven in the real world.
Take Michael Jackson for instance.
He was found innocent, but the stigma never went away, and plenty of people doubt his innocense to this day.
He didn’t go to prison, because he had a crack law team. How good are your lawyers?
‘Figurative’ seems to be under the delusion that there were no pedophiles in America between Jan2001 and Jan2009.
That kind of ‘thinking’ is truly unfortunate.
For the kids.
“Figurative” is paid by the post.
Asymptomatic Carriers…
As we become more dependent on computers, and their infrastructure essential, added with the demand for our devices to be constantly available, is it not critical to insure each machine is not playing a part which could negatively affect others?
Linux, Mac, and other non-Windows platform users (e.g., Windows Mobile, Palm, Android, Symbian, Blackberry, to name a few) currently may have a wrongheaded attitude when it comes to security. These users believe they can surf, open and forward attachments, and emails with impunity… but in truth they maybe inadvertently propagating malicious code that can affect the Windows desktop globally…. Again, is there an individual responsibility lacking which clearly affects us all?
Today, due to the overwhelming majority of malicious attacks directed at Windows, are Linux and Mac machines on the LAN and part of the whole “infrastructure” , themselves a security threat to the Windows environment and the enterprise’s data? Because most said machines ignore the need to immunize all data which pass through their domain.
As for the OS wars…Clearly security through obscurity works for a few, but does it make sense to cull that miniscule group which have the potential to infect a part of the largest group, and/or is it realistic to eliminate the largest group so the tiniest can claim the majority? Or might it just be time for a paradigm shift in securing our infrastructure?
Should security today or tomorrow be about the platform, an individual’s choices, or immune to both?
As has been stated so many times by others, all actions online, regardless of device, today have consequences, the question maybe; before you click, what are you willing to risk and does your fellow user have your back?
Clearly security through obscurity works for a few,
really? Apparently you haven’t noticed the tiny group of jailbreakers have uncovered their first virus. How many do you suppose there are, a couple million?
As for the rest of your piece, which is a bit hard to follow, I think you underestimate the inherent security of both the Linux and Mac platforms.
That we might be forwarding malicious code and are ignorant of the fact, I still stand by my earlier comment about the manner in which our ISPs are taking a proactive role in intercepting virus-laden mail before it even gets to my Mac.
I receive an email almost daily from my ISP stating they have quarantined a suspected letter containg malicious code that could not be stripped away.
This is just creepy… :S