New Hackings Begin ... Security Token or Not.

[Raydeus]

Re: New Hackings Begin ... Security Token or Not.

Heheh, yeah I think they are just hoping for it to be the usual stuff.

And in my case I am too hoping for it to just be another trojan which will be discovered and killed soon enough. Because if it's not...


/shiver

[ItazuraNhomango]

Re: New Hackings Begin ... Security Token or Not.

I wonder ... we seem to be getting a fair number of "inexplicable" hijacks, and some people are insisting that it MUST be something on the person's computer. What if it's not? What other possibilities are there, how would they work, what could you do to guard against them? After all, the information doesn't just get from your computer to SE's servers without passing through various systems in-between, for example.

Communications between computers on the Internet basically proceed from node-to-node, until source is able to get info to the destination. While it is theoretically true that communication can be compromised at any node, most of the in-between nodes are rather specialized machines--no one is surfing FFXI related websites on those. Besides, the major routers are valuable assets, and their logs are monitored for anomalies. (I think.)

The lowest hanging fruits are the player's machines--PCs, in particular. Most people are not computer savvy enough to understand what are risky things to do on the Net, much less have the knowledge of best practices in computer security or the discipline to stick to them. I was impressed by how the hackers recognized that the easiest way to locate the FFXI players is to let Google's ad system to find them for the hackers.

The biggest fruit would be SE's servers. While they may be hard to get to, even if only one hack becomes successful and only for a few hours, much damage can be done (or more aptly, much money can be made). Odds are quite a bit lower when it comes to successful hacking of this sort, however.

So, the end nodes--players' PCs and SE's servers--are the most likely targets. Since the odds favor a successful attempt on some player's PC over SE's servers (and the nodes in between), the smart money would be on a compromised PC or a user dumbly gave out info to some phishing site when it comes to account hijacking.

[Kailea]

Re: New Hackings Begin ... Security Token or Not.

I wonder ... we seem to be getting a fair number of "inexplicable" hijacks, and some people are insisting that it MUST be something on the person's computer. What if it's not? What other possibilities are there, how would they work, what could you do to guard against them? After all, the information doesn't just get from your computer to SE's servers without passing through various systems in-between, for example.

I'm just bringing this up in hopes of avoiding too much of "It's their fault because it must be!" versus "It's not their fault because they say it isn't!"

oh its defiantly their fault, just not Windower's fault ;p