Nuts & Volts - May 2007

underlying vulnerability as Code Red. By that point, the vulnerability was known for almost nine months and widely reported because of Code Red. Attacks that appear to come out of nowhere are, in many cases, caused by vulnerabilities that are almost a year old.”

If You Think You Have Found a New Vulnerability ...

Contact the vendor for that software. First, go to their security and vulnerability lists and try to find a contact. If you can’t do that, then reach the Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) at www. cert.org. “Try to Email them and say you think you have found something new and are not able to get through to the vendor,” Winkler advises.

You can also report viruses to CERT, though you should report them to the vendor of your anti-virus software first. They should have an email address or a channel through the program itself for virus reporting.

It would be good to know the channel for reporting them before the situation arises.

There are also a few things not to do. “Many people put vulnerabilities up on Bugtraq, another mailing list [now archived at www.security focus.com/archive/1]. But that gets it out to all the bad guys sooner than the good guys and helps the bad guys break in,” warns Mr. Winkler.

Realize, too, that once you have been infected, the damage is already

done. Though your anti-virus vendor may have an update that will kill the bug after the fact, reporting mostly helps others to make ready before they are hit. NV

About the Author

David Geer is a freelance technology writer — www.geer com.com — and sometimes computer guru. Contact david@ geercom.com.

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