full-disclosure - Web sites compromised by IIS attack

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From: frank at knobbe.us (Frank Knobbe)
Subject: Web sites compromised by IIS attack

On Wed, 2004-06-30 at 22:05, Denis Dimick wrote:
> They pretty much do. That is if the application is one that users have 
> found worth supporting.

Exactly. The responsible parties are doing their job. Now contrast that
with commercial software.

> So can I assume that you would allow a vendor to remotely patch your 
> system? 

Not remotely, but...

> Like I said, Do you REALLY want a vendor to install patches for you?

Absolutely. Have them send a technician ON SITE. Have them STAY and fix
the product until it is working. (Free of charge mind you... just like
the free repair of a recalled water pump for your car). If applied
patches crash the system further, it is the responsibility of that
technician (representing the vendor) to get it back in working order.

If he can't do that.... well.. since he is there, you can hold him
accountable in any way you see fit. :)

If we were able to mandate such a response, how long do you think it
would take before out-of-the-box software quality improves suddenly?

> I think Frank that your starting to point out a problem for M$ and other 
> vendors. They don't have the money to support there products any longer. 
> M$ has somewhere like 20,000 payed programers, How many programers are 
> working on open source products? 100,000 plus, maybe more. How do you 
> expect a company like M$ to compete? I don't think they can.

There are a lot of healthy, smaller commercial software shops out there
that produce usable (and often surprisingly good quality) code. They
typically also have good support and decent business ethics.

Some larger vendors these days are more concerned with increasing their
own wealth rather than producing good quality software. That's
unfortunate. 

In case of Microsoft, I think that this company has grown to such
proportions that it is starting to collapse on itself, much like the
operating system they produce. If that is going to happen as quietly as
a cheese soufle or as loud as a supernova remains to be seen (although
it will be spectacular either way). The next 5-10 years will be
interesting.

Anyhow. my main gripe is the sale of broken products. I don't remember
if that was NT4.0 or some other product, but the box came with the CD
for the software, and a CD with patches. "Here, your purchase. It's
broken. Fix it yourself while you install it."

Regards,
Frank

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